Kitchen

So we were chugging along great, on schedule to be complete by Emme's party THIS Saturday and then it happened. The granite people called & said that due to the weather and a broken down truck, they were a day behind in their installation schedules, so it will be Thursday before they get to us. As it was, Aaron was only going to have 2 days to get the backsplash done and that was pushing it! Now, I just don't see how it will be done. So to be realistic, we won't have the backsplash done, the island counter top is not in yet and the dishwasher is eternally delayed, or so it seems. There's still so much to do - here's our punch list:

- stain new trim
- distress island
- tung oil cabinets & trim
- install new appliances
- reload all cabinets with stuff so that the guest room is functional
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- clean up backyard
- mow
- finish playhouse ramp


I called the yard guy after starting to write this - so he will clean up the backyard & mow.

I'm SO ready for this to be over - you really don't realize how vital the kitchen is in a home until it is not functional. I have been rinsing sippies in the down stairs guest bath sink and we have eaten ever meal out for the last 2 weeks. Home cooking sounds SO SO good right now!

My in-laws came over today to babysit while I ran some errands for Emme's party. Jimmy started working on the kitchen a bit while Ann entertained the kiddos. LOVE them! They also came bearing diapers - we are so blessed! I think all I lack now is grocery shopping for the party and making a batch of cupcakes to supplement our cake. **On a related note, my normally very reliable cake lady called yesterday and said she had us down for June 19th instead of the 12th and offered another bakery as an option. (Insert Hillary breaking out in hives here). I didn't even mess with calling some other random bakery. Aaron's coworker dabbles in making cakes and his (yeah, it's a he) cakes are AMAZING or at least the 3 or 4 I've seen. He will be making the cake and I have no idea what it is going to look like - at this point I don't know that I even care. I'm sure it will turn out just fine and if it doesn't, we will always have something to laugh about each year on Emme's birthday.

Remodel Progress Report

A progress update on the kitchen remodel:

Cabinet doors & drawer fronts are sanded (once with 80 grit sand paper, once by hand, and once with 100 grit sand paper) and the staining has commenced. I don't have a picture yet of the staining process.

It's like brand new, never been finished before wood.

The shelving has been removed as have the appliances.

Need a closer look at the killer wallpaper that was once in our kitchen?

Ok, here you go. Yikes!
Where did you put all the stuff in your cabinets, you say?

In the guest bedroom....Oh dear!

To put it in boxes would have made too much sense.
Don't worry Tiff, your room will be all ready for you by the time yall get here!

Old, nasty appliances on their way O.U.T!

Kitchen quarantine.

We have purchased the granite & it will be installed Wednesday. We went with Arandas Brushed which is a honed finish instead of a glossy, polished finish. We know the backsplash we are going to go with, but we have not yet purchased it. I figure that will be done today or tomorrow. So, Emme's party is a week from tomorrow. Will it be finished in time?????

Remodel Progress

UPDATE 2/14/10: Now the dishwasher is on a "national backorder" so it will be mid-June before it ships. Emme's party is June 12th. Ugh! They are going to go ahead & ship the range and sink and then ship the dishwasher separately. This is so frustrating!

Before:

So above is the before picture. All white, super boring, untextured walls from when they took down the wallpaper, who lays tile straight like that - diagonal people - come on! It's cluttered (I should have picked up a little before taking this - ignore the sink full of sippies!) and I am not a fan! The appliances alone will be a vast improvement! We are creating a shelf for cookbooks and such in the island along with a couple of drawers for foil, Saran and the kids melamine dishes. I will lose a cabinet in the island, but that's ok. It will force me to purge some stuff, which is needed anyway!


As I stated in a previous post, Aaron procrastinated built a work bench for the garage before being able to start, but he has officially begun sanding the cabinets. Wahoo! He has been working so hard - it is truly a labor of love! He's in love with his bench, that is, so he doesn't mind the work!


I labeled all of the cabinet doors & drawers before we pulled them off. I'm anal like that! No, I'm sure we could have figured out which was which, but better safe than sorry, I say.

My handsome contractor - he looks really enthused, huh?

Saturday, the kids and I are going with my parents to King's Orchard and leaving Aaron to his sanding! God speed, babe. God speed! T minus 30 days. Yikes!

A Frustrating Journey

Since we first decided to get the kitchen renovation going and we ordered the appliances, not much else has been done. There have been some obstacles so far: 1. The microwave/hood thing we ordered has been discontinued. The only other one in that series (so that all the appliances match) was not only a microwave & hood, but is also convection and a steamer and made of gold and diamonds apparently because it cost almost $900. For.A.Micro.Wave!!! I think not. So we went back & forth about ordering one out of series, I called 4 other places & scoured the internet for the one we wanted and all places said they were discontinued, but offered the white finish instead. No. So Aaron and I finally decided to go with a different one and I was about to order it when something made me call one last place. Amazingly, they said they had 2 in stock. I'd like to pay for it immediately, I said. Ah...the silver lining. When we got home Friday evening, there was a giant box on our porch and inside was our microwave! One down. 3 to go! Still no word on our other appliances - last I checked with them, they were waiting on the dishwasher and then would ship everything at once.
2. The hours for granite places are not conducive to a working couple with little ones and we simply cannot choose from those tiny samples the contractors bring. Most places are open 9-5 on weekdays and 10-2 on the Saturdays. Uber frustrating! On top of that, Aaron & I have had a bit of a time agreeing on a granite. We did manage to find 2 today that we both like, but we had somewhere else to be before we had a chance to nail anything down.
3. And of course, it isn't like we can do anything yet anyway. You can't do the countertops without the sink and our new sink is in the same shipment as the remaining appliances. So we wait. It does give Aaron a chance to get the cabinets done, which brings me to obstacle #4.
4. Aaron is such a procrastinator! I love him dearly, but he stalls like none other. His new excuse for not starting on the cabinets is that he needs to build a work bench so that he has a place to work. So that is what he has been doing for the last 3 nights. He has finally finished it, so now no excuses! Sand away, babe!

All this time has given me a chance to consider paint colors and backsplash and fabric for the curtains. All of these changes make me think I will need to dishes too. ;) Don't you dare tell Aaron! One thing at a time, I know. All I know is this MUST be done before Emme's June 12th birthday party - yikes!

Remodel

The choice has been made: We are remodeling the kitchen! No turning back now - appliances have been ordered. Now all our appliances will match! I find it strange that the previous owner of our house was one of the architects for the home builder, yet he didn't choose to have matching stuff. Weird. The new ones should ship next week and so we have about a week & a half to get some other stuff done. We have a LOT to do: talk to the countertop guy - do we granite or do we quartz?, choose paint & hardware, backsplash, get new sink fixtures...the list goes on. Neither of us are super thrilled with our island. It has great storage & workspace, but it takes up a lot of room in our narrow kitchen and we usually end up piling things on top of it. We'd like to replace it, but I don't want to lose the storage and there are other technical considerations also (it has electricity & gas in it). So that may have to be tackled at a later date. We will be changing out our kitchen flooring later also, at the end of the year when we get the carpet. For now the generic blah tile will have to stay (again, architect choosing blah things??? - this is why Aaron says they'll give anyone a degree in architecture from A & M). I'll post a before picture soon - as soon as I have cleaned my kitchen and there isn't a sink full of soaking dirty sippies. ;)

Recarpet? Remodel?

I mentioned in my previous post that we were looking for new carpet. Our carpet is original to our 13 year old house. I HATE it, H.A.T.E it! I have anxiety about it every time new people come over - silly, I know, but I'm sure some of you have had this feeling before about something, whatever it may be. Anyway, I've wanted new carpet since we moved in, but everytime we've had the money, something came up. So today we had a guy come, bring samples & give us a quote. After we heard everything he had to tell us, we told him we'd like to talk about it and we'd let him know in a couple of days. Welllll, Aaron & I have been batting around the idea of remodeling our kitchen right now instead of getting new carpet. Our thinking is this:

1. We need to paint the whole interior of the house & feel this should be done over old carpet rather than new
2. Our ugly 90's kitchen drives me crazy!
3. None of our appliances match or are even the same brand. Replacing them with matching would be helpful for resale - we aren't planning on moving until the kids are in late elementary, but we know we will have to eventually because of space.
4. The kitchen reno will have more impact than new carpet
5. We can get the carpet at the end of the year when Aaron gets his next bonus after we have had time to repaint the interior.

So our new plan is to redo our cabinets, replace the dishwasher, range & built-in microwave (to match our refrigerator), get new granite countertops, redo the backsplash and flooring and then replace the fixtures. We may get new lighting in the kitchen (breakfast room is fine), but we can live with what we have. Believe it or not, we can do all of this for less than it will cost to get new carpet. We have LOTS of square feet of carpet! Hopefully, we can get right on this and get it all done before Emme's birthday party on June 12th. Since we will do a lot of it ourselves, we I will have to keep ourselves Aaron in line. You've heard the saying "The cobbler's children have no shoes." Aaron used to build AMAZING custom homes and has successfully worked in construction for over 12 years, but tends to - we'll say - take his time on personal projects. He is such a perfectionist, which I love about him, but I often feel he over thinks some things & his attention to detail is too attentive at times. It ends up taking longer. Once they are finished, they look more fabulous than I had ever imagined, but it's sort of painful getting there. Hopefully, I remember to take "Before" pictures and lots of "In Progress" pictures along the way. Wish us luck!