Removing and painting

So we decided to widen that kitchen doorway. It's probably better to do it now than regret it later. Like many before us , we had to figure out how to cut through plaster and lath without accidentally ruining our whole house. If you have an old home, you know what it's like to pound a nail in the wall and have a 1x1 foot chunk of plaster fall to your feet. Here's how we did it:


Well I, thank you, had the brilliant idea that we should score the paint, layers of wall paper, and who knows what else. We drew a few marks and then held up a big ole level (straight edge) and scored along it with a box knife. It was working pretty well and then I noticed I was hitting lath. So I decided I could go all the way through. With a little bending and prying, we got all the plaster off. The only thing left was lath. The reciprocating saw did the job. A little plaster fell off, but the new molding should hide it. The only thing left is the heater. We'll re-route it under the cabinets in the form of a toe kick. You say "what about the floor?" I know. I called back the hardwood guy and he said it would be about another $100 to put in some new Fir and Oak pieces. Done!

Here's Buddy helping. He enjoyed the demo. He sat under the plaster and saw the whole time. This is after we cleaned him up a little.

Oh and we picked a paint color. I'm not sure about it. It's pretty blue. I was trying to match it to the backsplash a little. We'll see if it works. If not, it's only paint.

Keg cups! Love them for painting. Hate them for drinking.
We're not wasting any time or paint. This is where the stove will go...surrounded by cabinets. Why paint what will be covered?

Did I mention we're taking care of the neighbor's dog for TWO WEEKS?! Nightmare. Luckily it's almost over. First day was first day of demo. Could the timing get any worse? I just broke out the blow horn. It stops them both in their tracks, so it's worth the ear ache.

Kitchen Weekend Number Two, demo + repair

The cabinet guys (Spencer Cabinets in Monroe, WA) showed up early Friday morning to a kitchen that wasn't even completely demolished, but they were done, so whatever. We stacked them in the spare room and dining room. I knew we'd eventually cram them all into that spare room, but the cabinet guys don't want to risk dinging them. That's for us to do.

They look good. Solid wood, shaker, white, etc. They did screw up one thing, but I really don't want to mess with it. The back on one of the "bookshelf style" cabinets was supposed to be cut out so that we can expose our fuse box. Yes, it's located in the kitchen. Well the back is in tack, but we will cut out a hole and paint the fuse box white to match. Then we'll install adjustable shelves. This way if we ever blow a fuse, we can remove 2 shelves and fix the issue.



While the guys were loading in, I was busy with a Wonder Bar (get one of these) ripping up 3 layers of linoleum. Low and behold, Fir floors! Who in their right mind would slap on a thick layer of glue and then linoleum? Seriously, what were they smoking in the '60s? And they say meth will kill you....what about linoleum?

So after a few calls I can return my tiles with a re-stocking fee (of course) of 25%. It's going to cost me $150 to return my new floor and another $880 to get these re-finished. He'll patch where we're widening our door. The floor meets up with the oak in the dining room, so this will be tricky. Then, over the course of 3 days, he'll apply 3 coats of Swedish treatment...whatever that is. Hopefully it works out because we're going with natural stain. So all in all, the floor is going to cost about $1000.00. That's about $400 over budget. Really, we're only going over budget by about $500. I think that's probably pretty good. $10,500 for a new kitchen~


I'm hoping the Fir turns out well. I hear maintenance is a real issue, but how can you turn your back on that? I feel like the house is breathing a sigh of release . It's thinking, "Finally, someone who understands me." I wonder what four-letter word it'll bust out when Buddy slides across the floor and digs in with 16 toenails made of steal?


Here's Buddy helping with the plumbing. Notice the rubber band holding close the cabinet doors? Hopefully we'll never have to use that again.

Here's the truck all packed up with the old kitchen. $41 for that dump run, but it felt good throwing it over the wall. I thought about Craigslist, but the cabinets are sooo crappy.


While we were at the dump, the electricians were hard at work ripping out a strip of sheetrock to run new cables to the fuse box. It's insane how destructive they are. Seriously, I don't think they realize we'll have to do all the repair ourselves to stay in budget.


$1000 and 6 hours later, we have 5 beautiful new cans, several new switches and plug-ins, updated stove plug (220), 2 pendants above the sink, and a re-worked fuse box. And a LOT, a LOT of repair work. Here we are hard at work installing the first piece. First it required a run to Dunn Lumber for a new sheet of rock and a few bats of R-11 insulation. For the first time the fellas there commented about seeing us there before . They were interested in what we were up to. We have a Dunn family! Pretty excited about that!


See the wall to the right of Buddy? With the heat register? Well we've decided we're ripping that out. Seems like it's going to be another week of work, but it's probably better that we're figuring that out now than in June after everything is done.

Oh, we picked out the sink and faucet too. Be prepared for a few nights of that mess. Which type: stainless or white? Then you have to match a faucet: color, correct amount of holes, etc. We ended up with a stainless, double sink (8 inches deep, 18 gauge) and a stainless faucet (pretty standard, nothing fancy.) If you know why they make a yellow-er nickel faucet, please let us know. I feel like they don't match anything. We should have just kept the old one, but the man insists it's worth the $117.

Also, the appliances showed up. In our living room we have a new Whirpool dishwasher and microwave.

Note: Living without a kitchen is not fun. I thought it would be like camping, and it is, except that there's no beauty or fun involved. Imagine camping, but having to go to work, being dirty, taking care of two dogs!, and not having campfires or hikes or swimming. Crappy.

First weekend for demo

The first weekend of the kitchen is now just behind us. We started ripping out the uppers Saturday and then did some other odds and ends Sunday. Obviously, it's easiest to rip out the doors and small pieces. Loosen the nails and rip away.


This is our exhaust fan above the sink. I think it's from the original kitchen when the stove was hooked to our old chimney. It was a little too powerful, but did a great job. We only used it a few times.

I think the most annoying and important part of remodeling a kitchen is setting up a makeshift one somewhere else. In our case, the best idea was the dining room. Microwave, toaster, toaster oven, and everything else in the cupboards.

The hardest part about a dining room kitchen is keeping the dogs out. Of course, this happens to be when the neighbor lady needs to leave for 2 weeks and leave her dog with us. Crap.

We're working on more demo over the week. The floor is what I'm most worried about. This Saturday the electrician is coming out to move some outlets, install 6 canned lights, one pendent, and add a couple of new breakers. And Sunday dad is coming over to help us with the plumbing for the refrigerator water and the faucet.