My cats have always just run and hid when people are over. I've tried really hard to slowly introduce them to people who are not me, but they won't have any of it. Any time somebody is over, they run and hide in the storage closet in my bedroom that's behind my clothes closet. Eventually I just propped the door open so Jake and Jenny could have a safe space whenever they wanted it.

On Monday I just left my bedroom door open. There's no need to close it because my cats will never come downstairs while the workers are here. Especially with all the noise they were making.

But what I didn't count on? Lunchbreaks.

When the workers went to lunch, Jake wandered downstairs. Then when the workers returned, he didn't run back upstairs... but instead ran out in the catio. Where he stayed the rest of the day until the workers left at 5:30 (I went out and put a litter box out there just in case).

After that, I just closed my bedroom door so they couldn't leave. I already had their auto-feeders and one of their Litter-Robots in there, so they were set. Except they stayed in the closet the entire time and only came out to eat and use the litter box when I'd sit in there with them.

I don't want them licking the primer off the cabinets... but they are going absolutely bonkers trapped in my bedroom. So I decided to build a kinda barricade to keep them out of the kitchen...

Let's see if you can figure out how long it took Jenny to figure out a way around it, shall we?

A) 5 minutes
B) 2 minutes
C) Literally seconds... you have a ladder for them to climb right over it, dumbass!

The answer is, of course, C. And yes, I am not smarter than my cats and a total dumbass. Jake followed immediately after his (much) smarter sister figured it out.

My second attempt was to wrap the ladder in plastic, which seemed to work great...

Last night I just moved and re-taped the dust barrier to keep them out, which worked fantastic...

Today was clean-up day as all the painting stuff was hauled away. My kitchen cupboard frames are painted! And they look great! Now I just need to have the backsplash tiled and save money to have my cupboard doors and drawers made.

And maybe my floors re-done.

Jake and Jenny have had the full run of the house since 2:00. And do you know where they are now? In my bedroom.

Even though I've moved their food and litter box back downstairs.

But what about the bathroom, you might be asking? You said that there was a big hole in the ceiling, so did that get fixed?

No. No it did not.

But we'll get to that disaster tomorrow. Right now I want to just be happy that I have my kitchen back after three years.