Help! Adopted a cat today, have some worries

[washngo]

So we picked up our lovely new rescue cat today. He is great, very bold and friendly. He keeps trying to get into baby's room and has got into her cot though, and has batted at her with his claws a bit too (playfully). She is 13 months (the baby, not the cat. He is 4). As baby won't sleep with door completely shut (can't even begin to list her many sleep foibles - another thread entirely) I think I will have to shut the cat in the little utility room over night (house is v open plan so can't really shut him anywhere more spacious). I feel terrible but think its the only way. In a few weeks when he's ready to go out we will install a cat flap and so he can go in and out and have utility room to be cosy in at night if he wants to be. But for now it is just the utility. Is this cruel? Will he trash the room? I am stressing out big time over it and cannot sleep :(

Good thank you - very awake and playful this morning. Only prob is he plays with his claws out and I am having to be really careful that dd2 (13 months) doesn't get in the way of them (ds and dd1 are 5 and 4 and generally v good at understanding when to move away). Hopefully the novelty will wear off for dd2 and she'll stop being so interested in him!

Best make sure that he plays with things which are distant from bodies - wand toys, teddies, scrunched up pieces of paper, boxes etc. No naked fingers dib-dabbing. That's good practice generally so that he doesn't associate fingers/body parts with games.

Maybe he doesn't know to retract claws or maybe he's still a bit unsettled. (Or maybe he has a claw retraction problem.) Other posters may have experienced this and wish to comment.

PS - thinking about it, it might be worth checking claw retraction if he comes to lap in the near future. It's always worth some gentle feeling of claws/pads so that he can get used to it in case you ever need to nip the tops of his claws. Just real gentle holding of paws to start off with for a few seconds building up to some gentle flexing/splaying over a couple of weeks if he'll permit it.

(He should be OK with it but I'm just being careful because as he's 4 years old, you won't know all his history and he might always have some sort of past trauma there.)

Cat has been going a little crazy this eve. He's been running around, leaping on things and kind of stalking me (!). What should I do when he's like that?

Give him something to chase.
Mine have loved a sock ball thrown up the stairs, and chasing it back down, or several knots in the end of a wide ribbon to make a weight.

He looks lovely!

Play with him. (Throwing him things to catch/chase is a good idea.) He's only a young cat and it sounds as if he's starting to feel confident enough to be just a wee bit boisterous.