Looks good.
You might want four. That way, when you pull the food and water dishes out for cleaning, you can pop another set in right away, instead of having to wash them, dry them, and refill them immediately.
Yes!
8 pounds of this, as I can also feed it to my 3 kitties, and it's much better for them than a 3lb bag of Special Kitty that costs like 9 bucks:
http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.jsp?productId=4397259
Nice that hedgie can share with the kitties. I'd add another dry kibble into the mix. If you have two (or more) kinds of food in their mix and hedgie decides s/he doesn't like one any more (either it's gone stale or the company changed the formula since the last time you bought it), then you always have the other one to fall back on until you can get another acceptable second food into the mix. With hedgies, you can't really do a full change over from one food to a different one quickly, else their bellies become rather upset and they have green slimy poops. So, say your hedgie is on just one food and it's recalled (salmonella) or they change formula and you have to find something else ASAP, hedgie is in for a hard time
The other thing to consider is that hedgies' nutritional requirements aren't perfectly mapped out. And they don't seem to be completely covered by one food alone. So, for the second food, I'd really recommend going with a different main meat. And I'd look at going with a different brand -- figuring two different brands are going to emphasize different aspects of nutrition.
I can buy crickets (live AND freeze dried from a local bait shop, as I can with meal worms and wax worms too, even cheaper than online, plus there's no shipping cost!)
Get the live ones; not the freeze dried. The freeze dried ones can pose digestive problems for some hedgies - blockages.
I am ordering a 2x2 (or 2x3) coro base (it's JUST over 5 feet of area) online from the GPC store, because I cannot cut coro correctly to SAVE MY LIFE.
Hahaha... sounds like a nice size. If you're going with a c&c cage, make sure the coroplast goes up the sides a bit -- it'll prevent hedgie from wandering away (unless the cube grid size is quite smal) and hold the heat in a bit better.
This heating pad (and also, maybe a heating light, but I don't think it'll be necessary because I also have 2 space heaters in my room, and my door is always shut, with NO drafts):
http://www.walmart.com/ip/SoftHeat-Moist-or-Dry-Heating-Pad/10752335
Do some random checks of the temp in your room at different times of the day to ensure that the space heaters are keeping up with falling night-time temps.
Heating pads can be nice for that post-bath time, but don't rely on them as your main source of heat. They all have that delightful safety feature where they automatically turn off after a certain time. Also, while hedgie may be nice and warm when they're on it one step off and it becomes cold. Hedgie will need to make it to their dishes, up on the wheel, etc...
If your random checks of the room temp (really, get a thermometer, stick it where hedgie's cage will be) show that it's varying more than 5 degrees or getting below the mid-70's F, you can definitely help even it out with a heat emitter. I'd go with the ones labeled "ceramic heat emitter" and not a "heat lamp"/"heating light" because the CHE's don't produce light while the lamps do. You want hedgie to stay warm at night... with the light off.
I'm going to make flannel cage liners (far cheaper than fleece, believe me, I use fleece currently and just purchasing the initial fleece was... oof.) and use diaper pad cloth for the absorbent layer (easier to sew by hand than a uHaul pad is)
http://www.wahmsupply.com/ZORB-White-45-Wide-By-the-Yard-249.htm
and Joann's flannel
Great. Ensure that you make nice, small, tight stitches when you're sewing the flannel and cloth together so hedgie can't accidentally catch a toe on the stitching.
I WILL be making a lid for the cage.
Sounds good. Especially with 3 kitties who are sharing the same type of food!
Did I miss anything? I very well could have, I don't have my list on me.
Let's see... food, water, dishes, hidey place, liners... oh, you may want to cut some spare flannel as little blankies for hedgie to snuggle with in the igloo... And, depending on your sewing skills, you could make some snuggle sacks. Whatever you do, make more than one. If you have only one of each, Hedgie will, invariably, decide to turn it into a mess at the most inconvenient time for you.
heating, wheel, cubes, coroplast... a thermometer would be good. There are relatively inexpensive ones you can stick to the inside of hedgie's house -- usually found in the reptile section of a pet supply store. They're great for doing a quick check to ensure hedgie's heating is adequate. Aside from figuring out where my hedgies are (eg, under their liner, under their hats, in their hedgiebags, or in their igloos), the in-cage thermometers are the first thing I check when I go in the hedgie room...
Overall, sounds pretty good. You'll know if you need more (like a CHE, lamp, and thermostat) after you get the thermometer in place and do some spot checks. And, of course, there are other types of supplies like a scrubby to clean the wheel, hedgiewipes (unscented baby wipes) to clean up oopses, nail clippers, medical supplies, etc... But it sounds like you have all the cage-related things pretty well covered
