My Cooking Space VIII

I know it's been awhile since I updated everyone on the kitchen remodel. It was a rough patch of times for a couple weeks there, I won't lie. To make a long story short, our kick-ass contractor got his deposit on our countertops stolen when the company he's been using for three years just up and closed shop without telling him. This put us way behind and had us wanting to burn our own house down for about 20 minutes on a Monday night awhile back.

But we pushed forward, and things are starting to really come into focus. Yesterday was a big day in the project. Lots of great work being done and, more importantly, lots of finishing work being done. One of those finishing things being put to rest was the installation of the kitchen faucet. Now, this may not sound very exciting, but we were stoked because not only did it mean running water in the kitchen for the first time in four weeks, but it also meant I got to test out the faucet.

And this is no ordinary faucet. We decided to get all fancy-like and buy the new Delta one where it turns on and off when you touch it. The video shows me demonstrating its goodness, and believe me, when I cooked some cajun catfish on the grill last night, that feature came in damn handy when both my hands were covered in cajun spices and marinade. Love it already.

My Cooking Space VII

At least I have somewhere to put the milk now. We're hosting relatives for the next week and while we can't exactly cook them a meal, we can at least have a place for them to stash some drinks and snacks if they so desire. As you can see, the new kickass fridge resides where the pantry once existed. Oddly enough, the pantry is where the stairs to the basement used to exist, but the previous owners decided to move the stairs to the deck, so they covered up the old staircase and put a pantry into the kitchen. Always evolving these houses.

The fridge is a fancy GE Profile, which of course makes my mom happy, as she is a GE employee and likes to joke that each GE appliance we have purchased during this remodel is saving a couple jobs. Both funny and equally depressing a comment, if you ask me. The other main thing worth mentioning is that my fridge right now is emptier than Kelly's, and that is something to behold because Kelly never has jack in his fridge besides a bunch of condiments and some butter.

My Cooking Space VI

It's been a week since I last updated the world on the kitchen remodel. And don't think it's because I don't care. Honestly, it's because I haven't had much to report. I know tons of stuff has been happening, but it's all little electrical things and stuff that doesn't exactly make for sex blog postings.

But when I came home Thursday night I had a nice little surprise: our new fridge had been installed (pics coming later) and cabinets have been installed where the old fridge was located (pictured above). For the untrained eye, what makes our contractor such a badass is that if you look closely, he reused the previous cabinets to fill in the old spots. So the cabinets above the fridge in the Before pic are not built out and down level with the countertop, and he simply moved the overhead cabinets on the left in the Before pic to the right. Later on, we'll be installing a pot rack on the left to keep the kitchen more open looking. I love that we were able to recycle the cabinets instead of having to make new ones and then just turning the old ones into scrap. That may be standard operating procedure, but I was excited about it.

Friday Funnies XXIV

While we continue to go through the kitchen remodel, I look forward to the future and seeing how it will all look in the end. At least I know it can't end up like this. I know this. I ... do. I'm shutting up before a massive jinx occurs.

My Cooking Space V

So now the kitchen is beginning to quickly resemble the scene in ET when the feds took over Eliot's house. Luckily when I walked in there was no one in the biohazard suits to greet me. So no X-Files moment for me.

We had to get the kitchen floor refinished because there was a problem with the floor where some of the old cabinets and fridge were located. So that put us behind a tad, but it allowed our contractor to put up the pseudo-hazmat plastic walls and make the kitchen more or less out of commission for a day or so.

All of this is in bigger preparation for Saturday when the new fridge and washer and dryer show up for installation. Nothing like getting rid of old, outdated models and bringing in some new, energy-efficient ones that give me happiness in my heart where the eco part of me lives.

My Cooking Space IV

Just like the Grinch's heart, the hole in our wall has grown three sizes today. Ok, maybe not, but it sounded funny.

So now the hole itself has been created, and we can just shut everything down and start celebrating.

Damn, don't think I'm getting away with that one.

OK, so we still have a long way to go. But it's amazing what a difference that hole is creating. I was worried that when we were originally sketching things out, it just didn't seem like the opening was going to make a visual difference or that it would end up being more of a distraction. Happily it's not like that at all. I can sit on my couch and see all the way into the dining room and almost beyond that, which is pretty cool. It doesn't tie the whole room together like say, The Dude's Asian rug, but it's got potential.

My Cooking Space III

Break on through to the other side.

Came home to the beginnings of the hole. This isn't the hole in its entirety, there is still more of it to make (it will probably double in length). Above is the view from the TV room. To the right is the view from the kitchen. Things got a little more complicated when one of the ventilation sections was discovered to be running right through where we wanted the hole to go. So we have a slight delay as we bring back the HVAC people to do some quick surgery on the vent and move where it runs. Oh well, it's all part of the experience.

At the very least, I am looking forward to firing up the grill for the third night in a row to cook dinner. That is a much better alternative for dinner than burritos form California Tortilla, which was our staple the last time we went through a kitchen remodel.

My Cooking Space II

The carnage in the kitchen continues. Tonight I came home to find my oven removed and a hole on the other side of the wall. Nothing too crazy, but it's fun to see a huge hole where my bookshelf once sat (the bookshelf frame is still there because we're getting it cut down in half and rebuilt to fit under the wall so we can recycle the product and not have to buy a whole new bookshelf.

The most interesting aspect to come of today's developments was that a funny thing happened when looking at the new hole. You see, the TV room in the house was an addition, something one of the previous owners did about 15 years ago or so. I know two things about construction, Jack and Shit. So I kinda giggled when I saw that the old exterior to the house is still there. Don't know why that makes me laugh, but for some reason I figured they would strip the exterior tiles and insulate or put something else up or do something, anything. Just weird, is all. Hopefully they didn't trap anything like a possum or something when putting up the new wall. Now that I wouldn't be laughing about.

My Cooking Space

What the ?*$%^!?&?

OK, relax. I wasn't robbed. Although when I first walked into my kitchen and saw the microwave and cabinets gone, I wondered if that is what it would look like.

Alas, we are remodeling the kitchen. And the process began this morning.

We saw this coming, but not this fast. We thought it would start around late March or early April, but last week our contractor said the job in front of ours got bumped and we were now first in line. This sent the wife into a torrent of stress I had not seen since the last time we did this when we remodeled the kitchen in our old condo three or so years ago. It was crazy stress then and since this is the first house, well, don't get me started. It's not possible to quantify.

Luckily, we're not going whole hog like we did last time. With this remodel, we're just attempting to open things up a little more. We're knocking a hole in the wall (the beginnings of which are in the photo above), getting a new fridge moving some cabinets around to make way for a pot rack to create more open space. This project is really about getting things the way the wife wants them so she won't murder me because nothing fits in our tiny-ass fridge. If I can accomplish that task, I think I'll be happy. And at least I won't have to sleep with a machete under my pillow.

I'll post more updates as this process goes along. We'll be in this dusty, tool-ridden hell for about a month. That gives me plenty of time to accidentally get my finger crushed by a hammer or lick some asbestos.