A turtle after thanksgiving dinner…

…is the best analogy I can think of for our current progress.  I know, pretty lame, but there you have it.

Our progress as of this week:

Monday- Purchased tile for counter top.  At home, a minor fight on how to repair the wall broke out at 10pm, which resulted in M and I giving up for the day.

Tuesday- Picked up needed tile and all accessories.  Only needed to pay with a tidy sum of money and the promise that our first born will take on a tile apprenticeship at the age of 10.  Unloaded low-riding car, and realized it was time for bed.

Wednesday- Grocery shopping and general cleaning of the construction site we usually refer to as the “dining room”…including doing a set of dishes in the bathroom.  Fun for everyone.

Thursday- Scheduled to meet our financial adviser, but ended up vegging out in front of the television in a pizza related stupor.  Both of us avoided going in the kitchen if possible- or relied on not turning on the lights if kitchen entry was required.

Tonight?  Welllll….wall patching and cabinet mounting is on the agenda.  Tiling is scheduled for this weekend, so those two steps are pretty crucial.   I just hope the siren song of the couch doesn’t affect us for a second day in a row.

Renovation Paparazzi

The pictures as mentioned before- crazy electrical wires, ugly cabinets, and the paint that use to be a margarita…

Sawdust in my Hair

Do you think anyone else notices the sawdust I keep finding everywhere?  Under my nails…In my shoes…Even in my hair? 

Or are people thinking I just have a really bad case of dandruff?

The cause?  (of the sawdust, not dandruff)  Kitchen demolition.  We took out the wall cabinets and soffit last night- and will be attempting to remove the lower cabinets this evening.  Turns out that the PO had tacked up drywall over the plaster to the soffit line, and then hung the cabinets.  So, when we removed the drywall, we discovered there had been a light fixture originally over the sink- and all that was left was a scary, scary hole with random wires (live wires??? who knows?  that’s the fun of it, right?) poking through.  Um, thanks PO.

Moving on…the new cabinets arrived on Tuesday- and man, if they were any better looking, I’d be cuddled up next to them every night instead of my husband… Ahem.

Anyway, agonizing over shades and wood tones was either in vain, or worth the effort, cause they match the other kitchen woodwork nicely. 

Tomorrow the plumber comes to move the water and waste lines, and then this weekend the cabinets go up.   

I, naturally, will be making a pest of myself as I take pictures of everything going on.  Just ignore any “dandruff” you might see in the upcoming posts…

Oh, and Happy Love Thursday!  The week is speeding by- so it’s nice to remember we’ll have a quieter summer of working in the garden coming up ahead…

Words escape me

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/17/garden/17akron.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Um…amazing?  Crazy?  Beautiful?  Sad?  All those rolled into one?

In a nutshell, it’s an extreme renovation story that involves 12 years, a falling-down house with a solarium (!), and the two owners who dedicated every free moment to fixing it up.  If anything, check out the before and after slide show- it’s really incredible.

As for my own (comparatively minor) renovation of the kitchen- painting is planned for the upcoming weekend- and maybe the building of a half wall…Stay tuned.

Drip…DripDripDrip…Drip

The contractor came today to look at moving our sink/faucet AND add electrical.

Yes, he’s an all around Renaissance man of the home improvement world

The good news is that it should be “No sweat”….and by the number of times he said it, I’m beginning to think that I could tackle the projects… Electricity and I are just passing acquaintances though, so I’m going to leave the liability to him.

To prep for the install, M & I went to a few different stores to see what was available-  our current sink takes up WAY too much counterspace, and the current faucet leaks if you turn on a hair too much- so it might be time to think about replacing both.

Sinks-  Acrylic or Steel?  Opinions?  We’re planning a self-rimming model (because of our future tile counter) and I’m not a fan of the stainless steel.  I would like solid surface- but they’re out of our price range.

Faucets- Attached are the pictures of the ones we liked- all would include a hand sprayer… Opinions?  While I kind of dig the black patina version, I’m afraid it’ll go out of style too soon.  We’re looking for a little longevity, too…

Couture Cabinets for Change

Ok.  So I don’t live in New York.

And I don’t think there is a company in Milwaukee that does this.

And I can’t imagine ripping out “near” brand new cabinets/appliances/countertops, so I can install my own “style”.

But this is still a cool idea for a whole new type of recycling.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/10/garden/10recycle.html?ref=garden

Eye of the Shark

The kitchen renovation has been taking up most of our attention lately- so this brief window of inactivity almost seems like the eye of the storm.

The cabinets come in just over a week- so by “storm”, I’m referring to the prep work still needs to be completed before we’re ready for the manufacturer’s delivery truck.  The same truck that’s circling increasingly closer and closer to our little bungalow to deliver our cabinets, while we gently float in a sea of “Plenty of Time”.   

And not to mix metaphors… but suddenly the circling truck makes it feel more like a shark preparing to attack the bloated amatuer renovators with splinters and installation arguments, than just a little wind and rain associated with a storm.

Err…Where was I again?  Oh, yes..the eye of the storm…er..shark…er…I’ve got some demo I think I need to do…

The whatzit gets nailed to the whozit, now?

M and I have successfully finished the first two legs of the kitchen race (flooring and design/purchase of cabinets, respectively), but I’m afraid the marriage widowmakers of remodeling are still ahead.

Yes, the actual installation of everything else.

If we had to chart where we are, and how ready we are for the experience, it would probably equal being at sea level for a climb to the top of Mount Everest.  Or maybe base camp one- where you’re still acclimating to the frosty Himalayan air, and thinking “It doesn’t look that tall- and it’s not that cold”.

I knew we were in a little deep when the kitchen designer asked if we were installing the cabinets ourselves, and then went into a speedreader’s version of the prep work and alterations we’ll have to do for just the crown moulding on the cabinets.

It probably didn’t help either that while doing the floor, I cracked under the pressure of clicking boards together.  In my defense, it is a bit harder than it looks.  Especially if the boards aren’t cut at perfect 90 degree angles, but who’s keeping track right?  Certainly not the flooring manufacturer…

Luckily, we do have a couple of experienced sherpas that will be guiding us up the mountain- my parents and M’s brother- so we’re not completely alone.  And ancient lore tells me that once you get one in, the rest will fall into place- but it all rests on the accuracy of the first one.  No pressure though.

Believe it or not, even with the challenges, I’m excited about our plan- and wonder how we ever lived with our stone-age kitchen for so long.

Cookie sheet slots! Who knew?  Self-closing drawers!  Who knew?  Under cabinet mounted task lighting!  Who knew? Cubbie holes to hide your stash of gold from pirates!  Who knew?

Our sherpas probably did.

I think the kitchen is a “spring”…

Tonight we finalize our kitchen design…and try to recover from the sticker shock.

At least we have the beginnings of an inkling of a potential shade for the walls.  The middle one- Crisp Celery…maybe…if it doesn’t look too murky with our lighting…

And, I love that all the colors have food names- fitting for kitchen wall color, no?

Curses! Blast! Foiled Again!

We had planned to take a break from all the kitchen fun* this weekend, and do some traveling for the Easter holiday…

So naturally a huge winter storm is blowing through the area- dumping up to a foot of snow in some of our “viewing area”.

If it comes down to sleeping in the airport, or putting down flooring…it’d be close, but I’d chose the flooring.

*In this case, fun may be used sarcastically, ironically, or out of frustration at the slow pace of progress.