New Kitchen

I didn't intend to take a blogging fast for Lent, but it happened anyway!

The day after Ash Wednesday, I went to our basement to get a meal out of the freezer.  While I was in the storage room, I noticed a dripping sound.  I looked around and found a puddle on the floor and a steady stream of water pouring from the ceiling.  I immediately ran upstairs and looked under the kitchen sink which is where the leaking seemed to be coming from.  Sure enough, the cabinet under the sink was filled with water.

The garbage disposal had shaken so hard that the disposal and the p-trap had come unattached.  So basically, the giant sink full of dishes that I had done had leaked ground up food water all through my cabinet and basement and soon to find out, my flooring.

We called our buddies at the mitigation company and they came right out to assess.  The floor was wet all around the sink and down clear to the end of the cabinets.  They had to pull out the cabinets and countertops and that area of flooring, as well as the linoleum flooring underneath of that. 

The flooring was a few years old and could no longer be matched.  And the flooring ran all the way through our kitchen, family room and laundry room.  The cabinets could be salvaged with some work and extra pieces.  However, we decided to go ahead and replace the cabinets while the flooring was out.  And our countertops were already in bad shape, so we decided to replace those too. 

I enjoyed designing my new kitchen!

We ended up extending our cabinets/counters in one area and totally changing the area by our fridge.  We put in two large pantry cabinets and they're absolutely wonderful.

In total it was a six week renovation.  We went through A LOT of paper plates, cups, silverware, etc... We filled our living room with our kitchen stuff and family room stuff.  We looked like hoarders for a few weeks the way things were piled in there.  We ate off of a tiny card table and four chairs that the kids like to shove across the floor.  We laid down blankets on top of our exposed plywood floors and tried to remind the kids constantly that the linoleum was very very slippery.

 

It was a long, hard six weeks. Things finally started coming together three weeks ago with new cabinets. 

 

Then flooring. 

 

We went with a tile (the same as the bathrooms) in our laundry room to prevent future water damage in there.  And they uncovered a vent in the laundry room that had been covered by the original linoleum when the house was built!

 

 

And we decided to go ahead and have the nasty parquet ripped up in our hallway and have it be the same flooring as our kitchen and family room.  After the floors were in, we waited on countertops and plumbing.  We also had some electrical work done.  And we installed a glass tile backsplash ourselves.

The kids did pretty well through it all.  A few behavior issues with the uncertainty of all of it.  And we ate out a lot, so our diets/nutrition went out the window for a few weeks.  But now that it's finished, all is back to normal and it really is my dream kitchen. We also repainted the family room and kitchen.  Things are very fresh and clean now!

Installing the tile

2015 was supposed to be the year of no home repairs, but we didn't even last two months...  Hopefully this about covers it and we can just enjoy our beautiful and mostly brand new home for many many years to come!!