97% Done!

This past week we have nearly finished all the cabinets (still need to install some drawer fronts, glass, and knobs), installed our counter top, installed appliances, finished electrical work (still awaiting the shades for our island pendants), and we are now awaiting the plumbing, which is tomorrow. I cannot wait for what I consider to be the most important appliance: my dishwasher!

Here are some pictures of where we are at right now:


You can see we still need the shades on the pendant, plus we need glass on the side door of the island and in the upper cabinets:


Shot from one end to the other - check out our new fridge! GE Cafe, side by side.



Bare naked bulbs need some shades! Hood was purchased on Overstock.com of all places:



Counter top made of Brazilian soapstone and our farmhouse sink:



View of island and range:


These are called runnels I think. Some people call them drainboards. They help reduce pooling of water on your counter top as you are drying dishes.



Mixed hardware scraps make for some cool looking pull out drawers. Andrew will install the drawer fronts and hardware this weekend.


We will be putting things away and COOKING all weekend long! Yippee!!!

Kitchen is Almost Done!

So yes, I suck at blogging. But here I am, a couple of months later, back at it again. We are about a week out from a finished kitchen, and not a moment too soon. I will be on October break for an entire week for the first actual week of a finished kitchen. Yay! I don't have to scrounge around for food anymore and beg from teenagers!

Our cabinets FINALLY arrived from Scherrs Cabinets. Of course, it didn't arrive in perfect condition and some cabinets were nicked and damaged. They easily accepted them back from us. The biggest issue came from this IDIOT who our contractor hired to install the cabinets. Well, wherever that guy went to cabinet installation school should take his cabinet diploma back. The dunce managed to put the doors on BACKWARDS so that the painted finished side was facing in, and the unfinished side out. If that wasn't bad enough, he put exposed screws on the outside so all you saw were silver screws on the outside of each cabinet. He was fired immediately by our contractor, who had to cover the cost for new upper cabinets. Argh.

Well, here they are:

View from living room:


View from dining room:


Pantry + Desk area:



Close up of desk:


Farmhouse apron front sink by Franke:


We also ordered some lights from Overstock.com. For our dining room chandelier, we ordered the Ventura, partly for the name.



Cabinets, almost done and organized!




This week should be countertop and appliances! Finally, a working kitchen after 3 LONG months.

Standstill

So now we are at a standstill. We are awaiting the arrival of our cabinets. We purchased cabinets from this company in North Dakota, called Scherr's Cabinet and Doors. We were really happy with their sample, but I am not impressed with how long it is taking to get these cabinets. We pretty much cannot continue until we have those. We are also debating on paint colors and counter material. The cabinets are shipping tomorrow so we will see how it all goes! I believe we are less than 1 month away from our finished kitchen! Tomorrow I will create a post on all of our fixtures and finishings. :)

Floors

When we first moved into this house we needed a major floor refinishing. We also had a LOT of problems with termite damage and urine damage to our floors. We hired Steve Jordan of Jordan Hardwood Floors to come and splice in new floors (this is where they pull out the damaged boards and put new ones in its place) and to refinish our 70 year old floors. He did such a great job, we hired him again for our kitchen hardwood floors.

Again, he had to splice in some new floors to add on to our existing hardwood floors. These new boards in the dining room are where we used to have that ugly indoor patio.



Old patio area:


Kitchen and dining area:


A different angle:

Attic

Remember that scene in Christmas Vacation where Chevy Chase gets stuck up in the attic while his entire family goes out shopping? He freaks out at first but then realizes he can reminisce and watch old home movies of his family while snuggling with old mementos. Well, I can lock Andrew up in the attic now too! Except our attic is super hot. As they were tearing off the roof Andrew realized how much attic space we had and asked DMH to create working attic for us. We had them cut a hole into the ceiling and install a telescopic attic ladder so we could extend it down and climb up to store items we didn't need (such as all of Audrey's clothes that she has already outgrown!).

Access in the ceiling of the hallway:


Hello ladder:


Wow, you are a long ladder!:


Audrey's bedding and clothes:


Look at all the space!

We Love Arches

One of the prerequisites we had for a home was that it had to have arches. We love arches, and they do such a nice job of separating two spaces without using a door. Plus, they are soft, curvy, and pretty. We already had two arches in our house, one separating the entrance from the living room, and another separating the living room from the dining room. Now we wanted one to signal a separation between the dining room and the kitchen, while still keeping it open. On a practical note, we really needed the arch just to keep the ceiling up and supported.

I need to mention that all of the work has been done by Denis M. Hughes of DMH Construction. We are so pleased with Denis' work. He and his helper Eric are on the site every day, working hard, cleaning up after themselves, being completely courteous, and overall fantastic. I would highly recommend them any day. Denis created this arch for us:



Different angle:


With drywall:




Denis in the foreground, Eric in the back:


The new arch and the original arch:


Denis in the dining room:


The kitchen (view from living room):


More to come.

New Floor and Roof

We needed to jackhammer out the old concrete in the patio area and pour in new concrete to make it even with the existing dining room floor. In addition to that, we needed to raise the roof line so that it no longer slopes down (like an outdoor roof would) but be at the same height as the rest of the room.

Old roof line:


Adios roof:


New roof line:


And new floor:


The space: