The Kitchen.Is.Done.

Ok, here we go.

This is the original kitchen. The full extent of the countertop is what you see here, and a little farther on the right, just covering the dishwasher. That was it.

The oven was so small that you could not fit a full-size cookie sheet in it. The stove, as you can see, had a (mostly worthless) jenn-air grill on one side, and 2 crappy electric burners on the other side.

The cabinets were original. Painted, but still old. The drawers stuck, and the maddeningly, the sink was not centered under the window. It’s hardly the worst kitchen in the world, but we had completely remodeled the kitchen in our old house, so this was a step backward, and we lived with it for nearly 8 years.

Here is the stainless prep table we used for extra counter space and a breakfast bar for the kids. I got this last summer and it significantly improved the functionality of the kitchen. In fact, I loved it so much that I said I would not be willing to put in a new kitchen unless we included an island/breakfast bar area.

The refrigerator was sitting in front of the original exterior door, which was redundant, since somewhere along the way a sliding door had been installed in the dining room (just feet away, as you can see). This allowed us to put in a cabinet to use as a pantry.

As you can see, due to very limited storage space, we had stuff sort of packed in all over the place. This side of the kitchen was basically empty. A neighbor has this same setup, and they have a small table and chairs in this space, so I guess it was originally intended to be an eat-in kitchen.

I made a short video of the project from start to finish.

You can also visit the entire Flickr Photo Gallery with even more photos.

And here we are, all finished!

Oak Flooring, Ikea Abstrakt White Gloss Cabinets & Black Walnut Countertops

Let’s walk around the kitchen…

This is the Ikea Praktfull Pro A51 Gas Range

Z-line Extractor Hood

Backsplash is a stainless steel panel we ordered & had cut/bent to fit

Dishwasher is a Whirlpool we bought several months ago

Open shelving are Ikea Brackets w/Custom black walnut shelves

Light over sink was a vintage find from the Boomerang Room

We did not buy a new sink. I liked our old sink, and although undermount/single bowl sinks are all the rage these days, I just couldn’t justify a new sink since I always liked this one. It ended up looking really great.

Faucet is Kohler Simplice and I LOVE it.

Fridge is Whirlpool-made Ikea counter-depth fridge. Also, LOVE.

Lighting over bar is Murray Feiss Beso Mini Pendant

I am planning to get a Charley Harper print for the wall above the bar.

Pantry cabinet with pull-out drawers. LOVE.

Pull out trash & recycling? LOVE.

Also, this is a good shot of the gorgeous grain in the black walnut. We ended up treating them with polyurethane instead of mineral oil. I could not fathom cutting on this gorgeous wood, so we do use cutting boards and treat them like a tabletop. They are so beautiful that I don’t mind being a little extra careful with them.

I don’t know if I mentioned this in a previous post, but we were incredibly lucky to happen to start this project just as Ikea had it’s 20% off kitchens sale. Doing a little bit of the work ourselves helped, too, as well as the incredible price we got on the countertops. (Thanks, Joe!!) Our budget was quite tight for a total remodel (about 16K of equity) and incredibly, we went over by less than a thousand dollars.

This project was fun, stressful, and ultimately extremely rewarding. Not only do I get to live with this kitchen every day, I get the satisfaction of knowing that the I did 100% of the design and layout. I tweaked our plan SO many times and worked through every potential problem to come up with the perfect layout for us, and so far I do not have a single complaint.

Thanks so much to those of you who offered your encouragement and support through the project. It really took over my life for a couple of months, but I am so happy we finished when we did, because now I can get outside and enjoy this amazing weather!

The General State of Things (GSOT)

So, I know last week I promised a big kitchen update within the week. But, today they are coming to finish up the last 1% of the project (stove backsplash, open shelving, sink light), so I want to wait until all of that is complete before I do the final post. I’ve got it on the books to start (if not finish) that tomorrow!

I’ve spent the last week “normalizing”. Some of you will remember that a couple of months before we started the project I went through the house and did a big purge/clean/organize and had done a really good job of keeping up with things. Well, all of that totally fell apart as the kitchen project got underway, so I’ve been tackling the piles of paper, backed-up laundry, filthy bathrooms and messy bedrooms.  It feels really good to be getting back to my regular routine.

I have had two separate friends under 2 entirely different contexts point out recently that I am what one of them called “an immersionist” and what the other referred to as someone who is “all-in”. When I am immersed in a project, everything else sort of falls away (see paragraph above). Was I working on the kitchen 24 hours a day? No. Would it have been possible for me to keep up with the household stuff during the project? Sure. But I often found myself wandering around the house, trying to figure out what to do. I just couldn’t think outside the project. Family members would have to run out of clothing before I would remember that I still had to do laundry, etc.

CONFESSION: At one point, Fisher had to do 3 weeks of homework all at once because we were so behind on “normal” life. Parenting win!

I think this also contributes to my, shall we say, low tolerance for stress. Because a major project like this becomes my world, when there is a problem it feels like a WORLD-ENDING PROBLEM. Logically, I know everything will work out fine in the end, but physically I respond to bumps in the road as if they are life-threatening.  I am hoping that I have gained some perspective on that tendency, and so that moving forward I can try to keep a bit more balance. Although, in my defense, gutting and renovating a kitchen *is* a pretty major undertaking. But I think that I can gain some insight here that can be applied to future situations on a smaller scale.

We are planning to have a kitchen-warming party/open house in a few weeks. If you’d like to come, let me know. I’ll be sending out an invite on facebook, so if we’re not friends there, look me up (thatpatti). Also, if I only know your internet name, tell me who you are, because I don’t friend total strangers.

Kitchen Update : Hell Week(s)

I PROMISE that within the next week, finished or not, I will make a giant Kitchen Update.  It’s been a little crazy around here, what with a number of unexpected issues cropping up at the very end of the project. I was going to write it all out, but honestly, it just doesn’t seem nearly as overwhelming and exhausting as it actually was as it was happening. Let’s just say that every time we thought we were turning a corner, we’d run into a wall.

I am so thankful for my dad and his knowledge and ability, because it saved us a ton of money, which is excellent, because at the moment, that well is running quite dry, thankyouverymuch. Although as I said on Twitter, it requires a certain amount of patience when you’re crack plumbing team consists of a 73 year old man with a history of stroke and….well, ME. I have to say, though, while my dad might not move very fast these days, he’s incredibly strong. It’s kind of amazing, actually.

Anyway, now all of our major issues should be resolved. And I am so relieved. We have a handful of things left to complete (mostly tomorrow), but aside from the dishwasher not being hooked up yet (there’s too much space around it and i’m trying to decide how i want to solve the problem) we’ve got a fully functioning kitchen. And it is AWESOME.

A big part of the frustration of the last couple of weeks was being so close and wanting to be so happy about the kitchen, but being unable to enjoy it because I was managing one somewhat overwhelming problem after another. But now I can finally slow down and take it all in and just be  happy and grateful. I am a very lucky girl.

Kitchen Update – So Close!

Sorry for the delay in updating. Twice now I have written long update posts and then lost them. I just don’t have the time right now to mess with rewriting that stuff, so I’m way behind on the blog.

At this point, though, we’re getting SO close that I am going to wait a few more days before posting more pictures. The big reveal!

Yesterday it took nearly 6 hours to get the stove installed. We kept running into problem after problem, and then FINALLY at almost 7pm we got it in and working. And I have a gas range for the first time in my life! I’m so excited!!

What’s Left:

- The refrigerator will be moved in today

- We need another coat of poly on the counters. We are not planning to use them for cutting, so we’re using a wipe-on poly to finish them. they’re still a little rough in spots, so we need another coat (or 2?). But they are GORGEOUS.

- Sink/Dishwasher

- Lighting

- Open Shelving

- New plugs/dimmer switches/switchplates

- Paint touch-up

That’s about it. We’re exhausted, but I looked back at the calendar and tomorrow it will be 5 weeks since we started. Considering we lost a week when we had to refinish the floors, that is a pretty insane timeline for a total gut/remodel. No wonder we’re so tired!

Kitchen Update – Roadbumps

I haven’t forgotten about updating here. We hit a bit of a roadbump with the flooring last week, the primary issue being that Joe finished the new kitchen flooring with a water-based finish (which is what I thought our LR/DR floors had), and it turns out that they had been done with an oil-based finish, so they ended up not matching AT ALL.  I ended up calling the guy who had done my floors originally and had him come back in to re-do the kitchen (and refinish the dining room since we had damaged it quite a bit moving the fridge).

I kinda sorta freaked out and was VERY stressed last week while we figured out what was wrong with the kitchen floor and how we were going to fix it. Of course, it didn’t help that I was still grieving the loss of Millie AND the kids were both home on spring break.  It was all a little much, but it’s sort of required that you have a breakdown at some point during any major home renovation, right?

Anyway, we’ve been staying at my parents’ house this week while the floors are refinished, and it’s actually been really nice to get away from the chaos at home. It’s almost been like a mini-vacation for me since the boys are back in school and I don’t have much to do. I am now feeling much better mentally and am excited about moving forward once the floors are finished.

Tomorrow Joe will start installing the cabinets. Over the weekend we have some plumbing to attend to, and we’ll finish assembling the rest of the cabinets. The counters and the stove will arrive next week sometime, so we should have really good progress by the end of next week. We’ll have some details to wrap up after that (installing lighting, range hood, deciding what we’re doing for the open-shelving, etc.) but I’d say we’ll be nearly done 2 weeks from now. I am very happy to be seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.

This is from last week (before we refinished the floor). The white spots on the walls are where the cabinets will be. :

Goodbye Girl, Kitchen Project update

So. The last 4 days or so have been a bit rough.  On Thursday, after anticipating it for a long while, it became clear that it was time to say goodbye to our beloved 14 year old dog, Millie. She had a large tumor on her belly that had turned purple and she was showing signs of distress. We knew that this was what would probably end her life, and we didn’t want to see her get any worse. Although we’d seen it coming, it was (and still is) difficult. She was our first baby, and had been with us for a full four years before our oldest son was born. There’s more I’d like to write about this, but I know it will get me crying again and I just can’t handle any more crying right now.

(I have this great print of Scott and I with her after we first got her, but I can’t seem to track it down. Here’s another favorite from a few years ago…)

On Friday, I had to head down to Ikea to order our cabinets and appliances. I ended up taking my parents, my 5 year old, and our younger dog, Dixie. I was worried that all of that company would overwhelm me, but it actually ended up being a good distraction. I was anxious ordering the cabinets. We had carefully reviewed our plan with Joe, and the kitchen staff at Ikea also went over it with me, but hey – it’s a lot of money and all of the responsibility of making sure we were getting all the right stuff was sitting squarely on my shoulders. It was a lot to bear on top of the emotional weight I was already carrying.

On Saturday, I had a minor freakout. Grief + Anxiety + PMS hitting at a TERRIBLE time meant that I just got sort of emotionally overloaded and had a bit of a meltdown. I freaked out on Amy a little bit, and she sent Joe over to review our project plan, what we had paid for already and what we still needed to pay for, and I felt much better.

There is a lot happening in the kitchen this week. Truth be told, I’m still feeling a little overwhelmed. The floors will be installed, sanded & finished. Scott and I will prime (and possibly paint) all the walls. Cabinets arrive and we will start assembling them on thursday and they will begin to be installed on Friday.

Also, I’m trying to sell our fridge so that we can put the new one in the dining room so that it’s not taking up precious space in our small garage – the only place we have to store all of the cabinets.

I have been very back and forth about what to do with countertops. We are waiting for a quote to do concrete on the main areas, with black walnut on the breakfast bar. If that doesn’t come in cost-comparable to the incredible price joe is giving us on the wood, we will just go with the wood throughout. At this point, I mostly just want to make a decision.

We did decide to use this as the inspiration for the outside portion of the breakfast bar.

So the countertop will drop straight down from the overhang, sort of boxing in the seating area like you see above. There’s a wall on the other side, so we won’t do it on that side, but i think the asymmetry will look cool. Super excited about this. :)

Also, it’s Spring Break this week, so I need to try and fit in some fun stuff for the kids!

Kitchen Update : Decisions, Decisions

Whoa. I’m tired.

Scott and I have spent the last three nights finishing up the demo work in the kitchen – taking out the lower cabinets (including stovetop, sink & dishwasher) and taking up the eleventy-two layers of flooring.

During the day this week, Joe and Matt worked on the electrical, which from what I gather was kind of a mess/pain in the ass. Then Joe got to work patching up the drywall…

And after all of their hard work, and our hard work, we find ourselves with a blank slate!

 

This is exciting, because everything from here on out is putting the kitchen back together! It is now time to get serious about making decisions.  First, the floor:

FLOORING

We decided early on that carrying in the wood flooring from the living room/dining room made the most sense. We have slate tile in the entry way that I sort of love since it’s very mid-century (house was built in ’57), and I don’t want three different kinds of flooring on the main level of the house. First I got a quote from the guy who refinished our floors, but did not seem particularly enthusiastic about the job. It was at that point that Joe told me that he can install floors, too (!!!), so we decided we’d just let him do that as well!

After discussing several options, I decided to have him simply run the boards in the opposite direction for the kitchen. We didn’t want to mess with the hassle of creating a seamless transition (which might end up being noticeable anyway). We were going to do a single board running the opposite direction for a smooth transition, but then Joe suggested the option of running the boards the other way for the whole kitchen, and I think it will be a neater transition visually than doing just one perpendicular board.

LIGHTING

In the interest of our budget, we decided to forego adding can lighting to the kitchen. We picked up this fixture at Ikea for the center of the room:

I think we’ve decided on 2 of these for over the bar

I have looked at a lot of lighting, and this was the first one that made me *gasp*. It’s a little more modern than what I’ve got going on in the other parts of the house, but I’m one to choose stuff I love over stuff that fits some design scheme. They are very reasonably priced, too, so it seems like a good choice.

I need to find something else to go over the sink. I may just put a can light in there to avoid having to make another decision. Also, I’m planning to put a shelf over the sink, so a recessed light would be out of the way.

COUNTERTOPS

I hadn’t even considered butcher block until Joe mentioned that he and Amy were planning to but Black Walnut in their house. When I thought of butcher block, I always thought of a lighter wood like maple, but when I saw the black walnut I fell IN LOVE.  And since Joe is a master carpenter, he can totally put those in, too! Not only that, he’s able to get me an AMAZING price – lower than just about anything save a laminate.

I’ve read and heard very mixed things about using butcher block for all countertops. Joe said he would seal the areas around the sink and dishwasher with a water-repellant poly coating that would help resist any problems with water damage. Also, it looks TOTALLY sweet. I originally wanted dark wood cabinets with white counters, so this gives me the same feel. Plus, I think the dark would will really warm up the stark glossy whiteness of the cabinets we chose.

We are looking at possibly doing concrete on the main areas and the walnut on the island, but if that ends up being more expensive and/or I don’t like it, we’ll just go with the walnut all over. Again – we’re on a budget, so that will likely be the driving force behind our final decision on countertops.

APPLIANCES

We have a brand new dishwasher, so we were in the market for a range and a counter-depth fridge. Since Ikea is having a 20% off sale this month, I did some heavy research into their appliances. I’d heard some not-so-great things, but the fact is, unless you are buying really high-end appliances, it’s difficult to find any that don’t have plenty of people willing to complain about them. It seems this is kind of the way of the industry.

As it turns out, all Ikea appliances are made by Whirlpool and have a 5 year warranty. We liked the look of them, REALLY liked the price, and found enough positive reviews to make it seem like a good bet.

So, we’re getting this fridge (which will have handles to match our cabinets!):

And this range!

I am pretty damn excited about this range, you guys. We’re converting from basically a 2-burner ancient Jenn-Air electric cooktop, to THIS. Oh man.

CABINETS

I’ve also made a few changes to the cabinet design. It’s been nice to have time to work on this, and to be able to use the kitchen planning software to test out ideas. I love being able to tweak the design myself – especially when I am laying awake and night and come up with a brilliant idea to solve a problem that’s been nagging at me. I think that as of this morning, I’ve come up with a solution to every little thing that I wasn’t feeling sure about.

On Friday, I’m heading back down to Ikea to order the cabinets and appliances (which will be delivered next Wednesday for a mere $150!).  I’m sure I will have to make a 3rd trip down at some point to get some cabinet organization systems and stuff, but I’m ok with that.

* * *

Joe is starting on the flooring Friday (I think). We’ll throw a couple of coats of primer on the walls this weekend (can’t wait to get rid of that orange!!) and a fresh coat of ceiling paint. Cabinets will probably go in late next week. Then counters, floor finishing, lighting, painting, etc. It’s probably going to be at least a month before we’re nearing finishing up, but I think we’re making good progress. Joe continues to be awesome and say things like “no worries, we’ll figure it out!” whenever I start to get panicky about something. Amy says I can’t have him, but I’m ok with paying for his services. *wink*

And now, I’m going to bed.

 

Kitchen : The Good, The Bad…

Well, a lot has happened since my last update! After Joe took out the exterior door, we went from this:

to this:


After taking the wall down, Joe took out the upper cabinets and the soffit.  Today, Scott and I decided to take up the flooring. The plan is to continue the hardwood from the dining room/living room into the kitchen, so we need to get all the existing flooring up so the hardwood will run flush. The first layer was the Pergo-like flooring on top, which came up super easy.  And then, we were here:

See that dark spot on the floor near the sink? Yeah, that’s not good. That’s mold from what was probably at one time a dishwasher, or possibly under-sink leak. That is quite a bummer, but the fun doesn’t stop there! There is an added complexity, which is that there is an entire geological system of floor strata.

Let’s take this step by step from the top

1. The pergo flooring we just took out

2. The white part on top, which is sheet linoleum

3. TWO layers of 1/4 inch plywood

4. ANOTHER layer of linoleum

5. 1/2 inch subfloor

We attempted to start taking up the top layer of linoleum, but considering the situation, it seemed terribly inefficient to take this up layer by layer. We also know that we need to deal with the mold situation, but we’re a little perplexed as to how to deal with it. Joe says “peel up, bleach, and let dry, then remove” – but does that mean we have to do this with each and every layer? How deep does it go? What is the chance that someone in our house will die from inhaling black mold spores?

So we talked through a few options for tackling this part of the project (one of the very few steps we were planning to DIY) and in the end we both sort of threw our hands up and decided we needed a more thorough consultation from the fabulous Joe – who, by the way, has been a totally and completely awesome contractor so far.

THE GOOD NEWS!!!

Yesterday Scott and I drove down to Ikea to take a look at the kitchens, choose cabinets, and get some questions answered. The issues that were nagging at me (for example : can i get a pull-out made for a shallow-depth cabinet so that I can have trash in the spot that i reeeeeally want it? YES!) all got resolved, and we decided to go with the Abstrakt glossy white cabinets which is totally not what I thought we’d end up choosing, but we ended up easily agreeing on the selection. So, it will look something like this:

I’m getting used to the idea of going with something so modern, but I am hoping to balance it with some wood shelving and bright splashes of color to give it a less sterile look than seen here.

So, that’s where we are. We were originally hoping to get the drywall patched and the electrical all run this week and start on flooring, but I’m guessing we won’t get to the flooring until the following week. If all goes as planned, we’ll have the cabinets delivered by Ikea that week and as soon as the floor is laid, they will go in.

The house is kind of a disaster, though I’m working hard to keep it semi-under control. Luckily, Scott’s office, my desk, and the TV room/play area are on the lower level, so we don’t really have to live on the main floor very much right now.

We’re going to start looking at appliances and yes, countertops, tomorrow!

Let the Kitchen Begin!

I think it’s safe to say that for at least the next month, you’ll be seeing lots of kitchen updates here. We kicked off our kitchen remodel yesterday morning, when Joe (our friend/contractor) came over to take out the redundant exterior door in the kitchen. I was amazed at how quickly he completed the project!

Today he is going to take out the wall between the kitchen and dining room! Exciting! He thinks that by the middle of next week we will be fully demo’d and ready to get started on the flooring. The plan is to bring the hardwood from the dining room into the kitchen, and we’re investigating our options. It’s a bit of a tricky project, but I am confident that Joe will help us figure out the best way to make it work.

I have to admit that after many years of being pretty heavily DIY, it’s awfully nice to have someone come in and do the work for you. Most of this project is beyond our skill level, though, so we’re happy to pay someone to do it. Especially when that someone is the awesome Joe, who entertains with fun stories and silly banter while patching up that doorhole in record time.

We are headed to Ikea on Friday to pick out cabinets. I have to figure out what I’m going to do about lighting. The main light in the kitchen is one of those long, flourescent box-type things. Trying to decide if I want to do a smaller fixture, can lights, or a more modernized flourescent. There will be pendants over the sink and above the breakfast bar, but I’m not sure what to do about the main light.  Also, yes, countertops. :)

 

Kitchen Project Update

Hey guys, I’ve been spending a lot of quality time with the Ikea Home Planner trying to design our new kitchen. We’ve gone from replicating our current kitchen design almost identically, to removing a wall and completely rearranging everything. I’ve also been working with the bank to secure a new HELOC (we close tomorrow – woo!) as well as managing a couple of other home projects that need to be taken care of.

Here is the most current version of the kitchen plan. This view is looking into the kitchen from the dining room. The left foreground will have an extended counter and 2 stools for a breakfast bar.

The current layout has the stove centered on that back wall (where the microwave spot is now). I wanted to bring it over closer to the bar for increased work area behind the stove. It will also be nice to have that long counter along the back wall for appliances and such.

The first phase of the project will start on Monday. There is currently an exterior door behind the cabinet on the right foreground in the rendering above. There is a sliding exterior door from the dining room (basically just to the right of where you are standing if you were the photographer taking this picture), so it’s totally redundant. After that, he will take out the soffit that currently runs along the ceiling on the right and rear walls, and after that we’ll take out the wall to open the kitchen up to the dining room.

We’re looking into bringing the hardwood flooring in from the dining room so that it is a seamless transition. I really hope this is within our budget, because I think it would look really nice.

Next Thursday is our 15th wedding anniversary. To celebrate, Scott is taking next Friday off and we are driving down to Cincinnati to spend the day at Ikea looking at kitchen stuff. An entire day with my husband on the road and at Ikea? I really can’t think of a better way to celebrate. We’ll take the plans we have drawn up and see if we can get some input from the designers there. Also, I discovered that they currently have 20% off kitchens until the end of April! Awesome!

No, I still do not know what kind of countertops we will get. You guys are obsessed with countertops! Maybe soon I will be, too.