On Saturday, our new sectional was finally delivered! (You can read more about it here) Before the delivery men arrived, Mike’s dad came over to move our current couch and our chair/couch (as we lovingly call it) into our formal living room. The living room had nothing in it up until this point, so while it may not be a permanent solution, it’s better than nothing for now. The chair/couch is definitely too big but the room is already getting more use than it ever has…

Yes, that is all 3 of our babies passed out on the new thing in the room. Aren’t they so sweet when they’re sleeping?

But the sweet never lasts. Especially when you have a cat named Macky and you get a new sectional.

Literally minutes after the guys put the couch pieces together (since he was following them back and forth from the door to the family room), Macky claimed the couch as his and started trouble.

This meant that we immediately ran to Target and snatched up some anti-cat scratch tape. It’s sticky on both sides and is supposed to be unappealing and eventually train them to not scratch the couch. We tried out a piece on the back of the couch for a day or so, then covered a Macky danger zone.

We’ve never bought this tape before, but we have had furniture shredded before so we were being cautious. Thankfully, it is hardly noticeable from a distance and only lets off a little shine.

We knew Macky was incredibly intelligent (he runs to the door when the doorbell rings, plays fetch and cries upstairs when he wants to go to bed), but even we were not prepared for his reaction to the tape. He went to scratch the couch and didn’t like the feel of the tape (effective!), so he decided to use his teeth to peel a piece off (ineffective!). I just removed him from the situation and stuck it back on. So far he hasn’t scratched it again and I’m hoping it was just a curious, “I’m just being Macky” moment.

Thankfully, Macky lost interest in the new couch quickly. However, someone else is couch obsessed (besides me).

Darwin. My cancer fighting, little orange love of my life (his arms are shaved for his chemo treatments, we call them his legwarmers :)). He never slept on the old couch in the family room, but he has not left the new sectional. He’s been gaining weight, but he’s still a little cat on a big couch.

He settled on the crack of the chaise and has since been the only member of this family to use the chaise. We are just so happy that he made it to see the new couch that we don’t dare move him. My heart melts looking at his little body curled up there.

I could not wait to get rid of the pillows that came with the couch. I shoved them in our linen closet and put out the ones I’ve been waiting to use 🙂

And of course, Darwin was available to model them.

I put the Organic Ironwork euro sham and Harbour Rope pillow (both from West Elm) with a wavy blue pillow I picked up at Bed, Bath & Beyond a while back.

We decided to go with the euro pillows because a) the couch is large enough to handle them and b) we fall asleep here all.the.time. I liked that we could use a real sized pillow and wash the shams easily. It’s supporting my back as I type this 🙂

I was a little surprised at how gold the couch is in the room. I thought it was a little more neutral and less clashy with the carpet. It also seemed massive at first. I think it just took a while to get used to the different arrangement and fabric. The couch seems large because instead of having a bunch of room to one side, we have now centered the couch and have some dead space on either side.

One side is housing Macky’s bed (which he sleeps in every time we’re in the family room, including now) and their scratching post (which Darwin is scratching now). Obviously very important elements in this room and I like that they are tucked behind the half wall.

(note to self- time to pry Macky out of his bed and wash it)

They were previously next to the entertainment center (on the opposite side of the opening to the family room), but more about why they were moved in a second. This space seems a little awkward and we were hoping to put a console here to store our laptops, phone chargers, remotes, etc., but I’m torn about where to put the kitten’s furniture.  One option is the other side of the couch!

Because of space constraints by the chaise, we had to move the accent chair we had in this corner (you can see it in the photo of Macky with his claws out above). That’s Darwin’s cat house, but it’s collapsable and he hasn’t slept in it in a while so it can probably go upstairs. We would like to put a round table with a lamp over here.

As for the accent chair? Well, it got moved to where Macky’s bed and scratching post previously were!

I know, you’re probably confused by all of the cat paraphenalia and need a full room shot. But I can’t give you one because we still have a bunch of stuff in this room that needs to find a new home. We’re still using our former end tables and ottoman for the time being. They’re just pushed out of the way right now, making it obvious that we need to find replacements with mucho storage.

We want taller, darker, round end tables and the round storage ottoman from Target that I mentioned here. We’ll get to it probably sooner rather than later since this arrangement isn’t quite working. But, two accessories that I planned for this room that I did manage to get were my weathered wood urchin thingys!

They required some mantel tweaking, but I love them 🙂

I originally planned to get just the large one, but I couldn’t resist the thought of stacking the little one on a pile of books.

So there you have it, 20 something pictures of cats, old couch, new couch and my West Elm finds all crammed into one post. Overwhelmed and confused? Yeah, me too 🙂