At least, the bottom one is. The top one, our smaller cat - Ash - can pass because she can both jump over it and, to get down again, squeeze under it. Unfortunately she's a right pest at night, scratching on the wardrobe doors or (if we shut the bedroom door) the bedroom door itself. This keeps me awake, though of course everyone else sleeps through it. To cut a long story short, I needed a door on the stairs to keep the damn cat off my door.
So the challenge was to alter one of the stair gates such that Ash couldn't pass it and it was still usable and safe. The first attempts did not go well. It turns out that cats are really, really good at getting past obstacles. When I made changes to the bottom gate, she even managed to squeeze through its bars, bypassing all my additions, until I wove string across them - which she eventually learned to pull down out of the way...
Pipe insulation, lots of string, dowel rods and spare bits of wood on the top gate and so far so good. Except that she sits on the second top step and yowls for 10 minutes when I go to bed. Still better than scrapes in my door, and at least I learned about lashing bits of wood together.
While Caroline's been busy acquiring stash, I've also been learning about basic carpentry, currently mortice and tenon joints and tonight especially about where not to leave my fingers when using a chisel. Oops. At least they're all still attached, if a bit ... gappier ... in places than before.
