Finally Finished!

All the walls are painted, all the floor is laid, all the cabinets are hung and the countertop is installed.  The appliance are in their places.  The dishes and cabinets have been organized.  And finally the window treatment is hung.   We started on this project the week after Christmas and today is March 24th,  I would call that three months.  This kind of work is hard when you are living where you are working.  It is very nice to have everything where it is supposed to be, especially the running water.  Now I just need to get in the mood to cook.   Thanks to my husband for a job well done!

More Appliances

We put in some more appliances.  The oven and dishwasher.  It is coming together.  Finsihed organizing the cabinets today and I am hoping that I have made everything accessible for a great working kitchen.  Below are some pictures.

Love the no button design of the dishwasher

Put some hardware on the cabinets and also installed undercounter lighting

Tile, Grout and Some Appliances

Lots has been accomplished this weekend.  After hard work with the tile and grout.  The finished product was well worth it. 

More tile and grout.

New sink!

New Fridge finally in place!

New place to eat!

As you can see we have been very busy this weekend.  Hopefully we can get the dishwasher and oven installed during the week and I can organize the cabinets and be able to function in the kitchen again. 

Counters

The East Coast Granite guys arrived around 5:30 to install my countertops.  It is nearing 7:30 and they are still working, about to cut out for the cook top.  Below are some pictures.

The Crowning Touch

Like icing on a cake and the right jewelry for your new outfit, so is the crown moulding on my new cabinets.  We worked last night until midnight on some finishing touches on our kitchen.  I thought the cabinets were so pretty with their smooth finish, but as each piece of crown moulding went up, they just got prettier and prettier.  We also got the backing for the bar up and some kick plate.  Our motivator was a phone call from East Coast Granite.  They came out on Friday and did a template.  Ivan called after 6 last night and asked, would it be ok to come and installed the granite Tuesday between 4 and 6pm.  I said, of course, can't wait.  Below you will find picture of our work on Monday. 

Awaiting the Countertops

Finished setting the last of the cabinets this afternoon, sitting here now waiting for East Coast Granite to come and take final measurements for the countertops.  Looking forward to being able to use this kitchen again.  It will be a big change from what the kitchen was to what it will be.

Our Car Has Been Suffering

Since we started this project, things around and in our house have been turned upside down.  We received the cabinets in late January.  Those cabinets have been taking up space in our garage since then.  Wednesday night the last of the cabinets moved into the house and freed up the garage.  Our car is now very happy to be back inside.  The pollen has started to fall here and it was none too soon. 

Wall Cabinets

The wall cabinets have been installed.  The kitchen is moving right along.

Cabinet are Being Installed

My dear sweet husband who knows how to do anything is installing my new cabinets.  One wall is complete with the cabinets and the corner cabinet on the other wall is up.  We are working on these this week and hopefully by next Monday I can call the Countertop people and have them come out and measure.  This is very exciting with every piece that comes together.  It will be so nice to get the house back in order.  It is amazing how much stuff is stored inside kitchen cabinets. 

Walls and Floor

After all the wiring, plumbing, and wall prep, we were finally ready to put some paint on the walls and put the floor down.  Below are pictures of our accomplishments this weekend. 

No Kitchen Sink

It has been a week now without a kitchen sink.  It is not that difficult to do without a range, but the kitchen sink is a whole other story.  Not much has happened this week, it has been very busy for both of us and progress is slow.  Hopefully we will be able to put some paint on the walls this weekend.  I will post some pictures if that happens.  Below is picture of our make shift kitchen.

Bye-Bye Range

Pictured below you will see my range leaving my kitchen.  This was bittersweet, this range has been there for me, for over 33 years.  It has never failed to work for me.  I guess you can say that range learned to cook with me.  Before I got married, I did not use the oven.  If any cooking was done, mom did it.  I learned a lot when I got married, mom was not here to do it for me.  Back to the range, my friend.  You were so faithful to me, you never complained about sterilizing bottles when my  babies were little and you never ever complained when you heated those bottles for me at all hours of the night.  You helped me prepared all of those meals for my family.  I thank you for all the years you did that for me.  I hope that your replacement will keep me cooking for many years to come.  You deserve your rest, or maybe someone knows of good home for you to continue to cook.  Just let me know.

Move of the cabinets also moved out this past Saturday.  All we have left now is the sink, dishwasher and refrigerator.  We installed the necessary receptacles and switches and are finishing preparing the walls for paint, hopefully to come this following week. 

Counter top being removed

Cabinet Section

All that is left!

Demolition

Now for the fun part.  We started this project after Christmas 2010.  We have purchased all the materials, now we need to start tearing out.  The wallpaper that was one of the main reasons for this project is gone.  My children thought that is was very outdated.  It covered approximately 1/3 of our house, it was the same from the Laundry Room to the Dinning Room.  When we built this house, my father-in-law was in a bit of a hurry to hang the wallpaper, we were expecting our first child.  We moved into this house on my birthday in 1977, our son was born on July 22, of that year.  One of the reason we were in no hurry to change this wallpaper is that we he installed it, he did not prime the walls and we knew pulling this down would tear up the sheetrock and would require a lot of patching.  Below is picture of the demo. The people in the pictures are my husband and my son.

We have also opened us the dinning room a little also.  Below are pictures of the new opening.

Making Big Purchases

 

 In order to do a renovation to your home, you must spend some money.  Just like  the game of Monoply, if you own property, you have to improve that property.  That means Home Depot, Lowe's, Walmart, Target, here we come.  The first thing to think about is you probably will want to buy new appliances.  We did, I researched what I wanted in appliances.  The color, Staintless Steel, the brand, KitchenAid.  I bought a single wall oven, a 4 burner gas cook top, an over the cook top microwave, and a french door refrigerator, and a dishwasher.  The appliances arrived January 5th.  Below is a picture of the Fridge.  The others are still in boxes waiting for a kitchen to be placed in.

The next thing we decided upon was cabinetry.  After looking at cabinet's in magazines and at the Home Improvement stores and thinking of building them ourselves, we choose Woodmark Cabinets from Home Depot.  We went and let the designer design our new kitchen.  My husband had drawn a diagram of what we wanted to do with our space.  The designer took over from there.  We ordered 17 new cabinets, which arrived January 27th.  We have inspected them and they are in boxes in our garage waiting also to be placed in our new kitchen along with the new appliances.  Below is a picture of my garage with the cabinets.

The next thing to think about is the type of counter top to add to these two purchases.  Let me tell you, shopping for these things are a lot of fun.  We decided to go with granite.  I went to several places and we went with East Coast Granite.  I was unaware of all the many colors of granite.  I finally choose the one in the picture below.  When our cabinets are in place East Coast will come out and make a measurement and cut this  and install the counter tops. 

We are planning on wood floors in the kitchen and dining room.  Below is a picture of the flooring.  We purchased this at Lowe's.

We also are going to use a backspash which we also purchased at Lowe's. 

I know I mentioned it before, but I just want to thank my wonderful husband for his ability to do all of this for us.

Kitchen Before

 The following pictures are of our kitchen before the way it has looked since we built our home in 1977.  My children call it The 70's Show.  It is a L-Shaped Kitchen  and very small.  We have celebrated many Holiday's in this kitchen.  We are going to totally change this room, hoping to increase the size and  create more room.