kitten confinement, or free roam?

Ok folks, first I'd like to apologize for posting so many new threads .

I've got the two kittens (niles and frasier), that are ~9 weeks old now. I'm wondering how much freedom/free roaming they should get?

They started off in the bathroom until ~2 weeks ago, then moved up to the guest bedroom, where they are now. They are in there most of the time w/ the door closed (due to our adult -and overweight- cat toby having a taste for their food... I have been taking up their dry food and using a cork board as a makeshift baby gate (but this has obvious problems).

I would like to allow them more freedom, but, our house's great open floor plan means that it's pretty much all or nothing...the den is connected to the living room and kitchen and we have a large fishtank in the living room and a recliner and computer (with wires) in the den.....I migtht be able to confine them to the living room if the corkboard/portfolio combo "babygate" would work, but now they may be getting large enough to climb/jump that.

What would you suggust? Is 9 weeks old enough to deal with wiring, etc. fairly safely?

Also, how much playtime should they be getting? Now they are gettng about 2 hours dedicated time, with some playtime with Toby (on the screened in backporch...which is for the most part safe).

I'd be very grateful for your suggustions and/or experiences with how you dealt with kitten confinement/free roaming.

Thanks again for your advice and help!

Art

Well, I'm not much help with "kitten-proofing" because my house is already ferret-proofed, lol. However, as far as wires go, there are many things you can do. You can tape them, you can cover them with a plastic strip, or you can buy some PVC piping and put them through the pipe so the kittens can't get to them.

I've always given my cats full run of the house as soon as they arrived. :/

I would let them free roam whenever you are around and then just close them up when you aren't. This is how I did it with my kittens and it seemed to work great. In fact I still lock my cats in my room at night out of habit.

I let my kittens roam the house at 8 weeks old. I put a litter box close to where they like to play , they would forget where the litter boxes were in the house. I eventually moved the litter box closer and closer to the original spot.
I have 3 -6 week old foster kittens..I let them "out to play" when I am home and able to keep my eye on them. I have a huge cage (for a 120lb. dog) that they stay in when I am not home and at night time. I think ur kittens would be fine if they roam the house as long as you kitty-proof it.

Thanks for your great replies!

I think I'll try to gradually move them over to free roaming over the next week...you could call me paranoid

I'll try letting them out in the whole house (with the laundry room, bedroom, and bathroom doors closed) this week while I'm at home and see how it goes...I think I've got most of the wire problems solved (except for lamps and the computer), but I'll just have to deal with the recliner...

Thanks again and I'll let you know how it goes.
Art

I have a kitten who is 3-4 weeks old and he prefers free roam, I actually only let him do this when I can watch him. Also he has his surregate "daddy" who usually keeps him out of trouble. ( our 10 month old male)He is starting to hate being in his box where I keep him when i am not there, so he is going to be placed in my daughters room, who is away at college,to free roam there.