Living without a Kitchen

When I tell people I am remodeling my kitchen there is always a question of how do you manage. Some make a face at how awful it sounds and one person offered to make food for me.

I have gotten better with the slower cooker but this is not the only method of cooking. I acquired a grill. And vegetables can be cooked fairly efficiently in the microwave.  In the 4 months of remodeling we have order delivery only twice. We do like to go to Lulu’s every so often, but typically for special occasions like putting the first coat of polyurethane down or a Packers playoff game.

I have been washing dishes in the laundry room utility sink. 

I bought a flexible bucket with handles to wash and transport dishes. Currently I have no running water on the first floor so I fill a jug with water to keep in the kitchen.

Every small improvement makes life easier: getting a real faucet that is easy to turn off and on in the laundry room.  Before that, the cold water wouldn't even turn on.  Getting the sub floor installed after having no floor and having to be really careful walking to the basement (to do the dishes). Every outlet that Papa Robertson gets hooked up helps.  

The day that I have a kitchen (with a dishwasher… and a stove… and a working sink) seems pretty far off (not to mention all the bells and whistles that are planned). I hope that once I have these things that I can really appreciate how much time they save. And how much less cluttered my dining room will be....

There was much cheering and then everyone laid down on the BRAND NEW SUB FLOOR and fell asleep

Ok- so that is not exactly what happened.

by 8pm last night we had three more pieces to lay down in the kitchen and we really wanted to finish.

we finished the kitchen very late yesterday.  

The sub floor covers the ENTIRE kitchen area but we still have some left to do in the bathroom.  

Dump Run

Yesterday Dad, Bryna and I went to the milwaukee self help station to get rid of kitchen debris.

Random Thoughts

On Saturday I broke two drill bits and the thing that bothered me about them is that they did not have good chip removal, ie saw dust got stuck in the bit.  So I bought a box of new ones that had a bunch of each size for use on Sunday.  One: I didn’t break a bit yesterday through 4.5 hours of drilling.  Two: the chip removal problem went away.

So here I am at the local hardware store, looking for the right nails for the nail gun. There are three things you have to match: attachment type, head type and angle, not to mention spacing but that seems dependent on attachment type.  A store employee is helping me, and I say, “couldn’t they have limited it to one angle?” and the employee, “Engineers, making it difficult.” Or something of the like.  I wish I would have asked at that point how many times he knocks engineers to have the customer says, “actually, I am an engineer” unfortunately I was not that quick on the draw.  Probably spend too much time in CAD and not enough talking to other humans.

This is a fun neighborhood! Lisa and I went to brunch on Sunday and ran into Pete and Lynn.

Lisa then took me to a three floor antique store.  I found where the people that we so adamant about buy the stain glass windows sell them, for a 100% mark up. Yikes!

Before I moved in I thought that once I lived there I would have more time to work on projects. But now that I live in the house, I don't always want to be working on it, some times I just want to sit around and read a book or take a nap.

Sistered Joists

Yesterday, we worked to make the kitchen floor level by sistering new 2x6's to the old joists. Thanks Uncle Larry and Papa Robertson!
We got a lot done, but I am finding that when you work on one project all day, the day goes by quickly. Where as when you work on a bunch of smaller projects it goes slower.

Decisions, Decisions!

In hindsight, I should have had everything picked out before we removed the first piece of plaster from the kitchen. But I didn't; and the only one that will suffer is me. 

Good news I will get to try again with the bathroom and I will decide and obtain everything before demolition.

Floor tile has been the big decision recently as I haven’t found an blue-green option for counter top tile.  So last night Dad was in town and we went to the Home Depot, we each picked out one tile that we liked to bring home.  Unanimously, six people picked the one that Dad had selected. 

I want warm tile in the kitchen as the house has many warm tones, but the one that I thought looked warm in the store looked very cool in the house.  The one that Dad picked out looked very orange in the store but looked very good in the house, not too orange at all.

An Open Concept Basement?

Sub floor is more challenging to get rid of than finish flooring.  

1.       It is underneath the walls.  Bryna took a circular saw and saber saw to the edge of the room.

2.       Once you remove it there is nothing left to stand on

3.    The nails are bigger…

So now I am left with what feels like a very open basement.  

And there was good news! We found a slightly random 2x4 that was protruding above the floor level in the highest point of the room.  We are hoping that this means that there is a lot less that has to change and will make leveling easier.

Taking a Break

I was reading an article on Houzz and it recommended that during a kitchen remodel you should take a vacation, my first thought was that then you won't get anything done but I realized they didn't know I was doing it myself....

But due to John's school schedule the three of us headed up to his cottage.

Down to the Sub Floor

Last night John and Bryna removed the layer over the sub floor, I got to do a little but mostly I tried to keep up with lumber removal as Bryna tore up the heavily damaged hardwood.

 

Now we are down to the sub floor, which is in pretty rough shape. Not really safe to walk over.

Next week we are disassembling the tiny bathroom, organizing the basement, and taking off the sub floor so that next weekend we can level out the old joists.

And John says, “If worse comes to worse…. I need to stop saying that.”

Kitchen Demolition- ie take everything out of the kitchen that you are not going to keep.

We removed the base cabinets and the back splash and tore through layer after layer of the ceiling.  

Please note that the answer to fixing things in a house is not adding a new layer to cover up the problem.  

But when we got to the ceiling that will be over the triangle we had utter disappointment, improper insulation. 

So then the upper cabinets got removed, I was looking for an excuse to get all new ones anyways.

we also found a hole in the chimney... and plug it with a t-shirt, which adds to the creepy factor.

Looking for Inspiration

No not pinterest.  Bryna found this website houzz.com, they have thousands of pictures to browse based on keywords.  If you start an account you can save pictures to your idea book(s). I signed up for the weekly updates and they have lots of interesting ideas, some relevant like space savers for kitchens or small bathrooms

http://www.houzz.com/ideabooks/5878841/list?utm_source=Houzz&utm_campaign=u211&utm_medium=email&utm_content=gallery23

 some not so relevant like hobbit homes.

http://www.houzz.com/ideabooks/5769721/list/4-Hobbit-Houses-Bring-Charm-to-the-Landscape

Gloss v satin

As I was puzzling over the stairs yesterday I remember this picture and just had to share it. My supervisor recommended that if I wanted satin finish on the wood work to still do all but the last coat in gloss. This technique would keep the depth to the wood because the satin finish has particulites that make it appear cloudy after several coats.

But the glossy is really shiny, the picture is after 3 coats of glossy right before the satin. The orange wall and wood work are reflected in the floor.  Luckily this went a way.

Finished Floors

The polyurethane went on very easy. I did a little bit of research and went with a waterbourne formula to maintane the color of the boards as oil based have a yellowing property. John and Bryna had also used waterbourne and gave it a good recommendation. I did not skimp on the type of poly. But for the real thing you want to see, pictures!

 

 

 

2013: 3 Heather: 0

When dad was here to help me move in he really wanted to get the kitchen faucet to work so that we can do dishes up stairs, we had pretty good success and minimized the leak to a drip that can be contained.
So here we are today, doing dishes up stairs after last nights rum floor party, and the sink clogs. So I get a wire hanger for John and he tries to snake out the clog. After a minute we hear rushing water and see water flooding the kitchen...
Jason had rigged this up so poorly that a wire hanger destoryed the joints. What a mess.
So all in all we started kiitchen demolishion today, which was not planned to start for a few more days.