More organizational ramblings

I so wish that there was some kind of magic wand I could wave and just have all the surplus junk leave my life instead of having to sort through it bit by bit.  Still, we're making progress.  We've tossed, donated, recycled, or otherwise rehomed 972 items.  Yeah, it's not even halfway there, but we're still plugging along.

Also, the appliance garage is dead!  I got a bug up my butt (where did that saying come from, anyways?) right before Ethan's 2nd b-day party, and I finally ripped the dang thing out.  And I'm soooo glad I did it.  Our kitchen suddenly looks a lot bigger.

Here's a pic of how the kitchen looked when we bought the house:

 

 And now that he appliance garage is gone (please excuse the not-so-great cellphone photo and sink full of dishes...):

 

Okay, so the pictures don't really do it justice, since the "after" shot is too close.  But trust me when I say it changed the whole character of the kitchen.  There's a lot of counter space that was freed up on the other side of the sink, since the toaster oven is now living where the appliance garage was.  And it just doesn't look as dated.  I can't quite convince myself I'm happy with our kitchen, but it's getting better.

We still have a big hole in the kitchen ceiling.  It's amazing, but I really don't even notice it anymore.  We're very close to securing the financing necessary for the bathroom remodel, so I'll be planning that with a vengeance soon.  Can't wait!

Kitchen mini-reno sneak peek

New floor, new fridge, new dishwasher!

We're winding down on phase 1 of the mini-renovation in the kitchen.  The floor is no longer scary, and we have a working dishwasher and a fridge that actually fits in the space designed for it.  I'm happy with the way it looks, and it completely changes the character of the room, even though the cabinets and countertops are still the same.  Removing the cruddy wallpaper and paneling wainscot will help even more, but we won't do that until it's warmer outside and we can open the windows to ventilate.

We went with SwiftLock Sierra Slate laminate tiles from Lowes.  I had my doubts, since it got iffy reviews, but we bought 6 boxes and figured if it didn't work out for us, we'd just return it.  The semi-cruddy reviews were due to the planks being bowed.  Even after letting all the flooring sit for about 10 days, there was a noticeable curve to each plank.  But as we slid the planks together, we found if we tapped the long edge with a hammer to help engage the tongue and groove, we had no problems.  The seams are not even visible.  It's so much nicer than the el-cheapo temporary laminate we had in there before.  The planks don't slide around; they all fit snugly together.  It was more difficult to install, since we had to line up the "grout lines" in order to make it look like tile instead of a haphazard mess, but Shayne and I are both very happy with the results.

The only issue I have is that it's more modern than the rest of the house.  It's not so modern that it's jarring to walk into the room, but it's obviously newer than the 1920s.  I knew that was a hazard when we started this project, but creating a more period-appropriate kitchen by replacing the cabinets and unearthing and refinishing the wood floor just isn't in the budget now that we're going to move.  I wanted to do something that was appealing while being totally reversible by a future owner (if desired).  While it's not the kitchen this house deserves, we didn't ruin anything either.  And it does look nice, and I think it's the best we could do while working with the existing cabinets.  It's just not the kitchen I had dreamed of for this house.

In the next "phase", we're going to add baseboard to match the rest of the house, remove the wallpaper and paneling, paint the walls, and install toekicks.  It should be warm enough to open the windows during the day for a few hours within a week or two, so we'll be moving right along.  In the meantime, Shayne is going to install the molding in the upstairs bedrooms, and I'll get busy sanding and staining the few bits of woodwork that are still painted in the hallway.

Oh house, how I want you to be finished....

Improving the kitchen

I think today we're going to go spend some money!  Our dishwasher has a chronic flooding problem, plus it never did a great job of cleaning dishes.  I think its day has finally come, and we're going to replace it.  While we're at it, I'm feeling like we should ditch our existing fridge as well.  It doesn't match either of the black/stainless appliances in the room, plus it's just a bit too big for the space and covers over the back porch/mudroom trim.  I figure we can sell it on craigslist for $100 rather than have the Big Box store haul it away.  Then when we go to sell the house, all the appliances will match.  I think we're also going to get some laminate "tile" flooring, since the flood ruined the el cheapo laminate "wood".  Since we don't anticipate any more water issues, the new floor will go a long way towards sprucing up the room.

Once it's warm enough outside, I'll remove the wallpaper and paint the walls sage green.  The ceiling tile will be removed and replaced with drywall (the plaster is beyond saving :(  ) once we replumb the bathroom.  And we'll get new countertops and sink.  It will be more modern looking than the rest of the house, but I think if I'm careful, I can incorporate some arts and crafts touches that will tie it in nicely.  It's far from the my dream kitchen, but I think the results will appeal to more buyers without clashing with the rest of the house.

It's a hard line to walk.  I had so many ideas and dreams of how I wanted this house to look.  Part of me cringes at the idea of a "stylish" kitchen, and I feel guilty for doing something not quite in keeping with the house's character.  But honestly?  Most of me is glad to be doing something, anything, that will help this house sell.  I'm also excited to have a kitchen that doesn't look like crap, even if it's not precisely what I had dreamed of.  It will be clean, the floor won't be wavy and bumpy, and I won't be ashamed to have people over.

I'm so tired of living in a half-finished work zone, and I'm ready to get this done.  Even if we live here for another 5 years (please God, I hope not!), it will be ready to sell.  It won't look like a construction zone.  I can get rid of my endless cans of shellac, denatured alcohol, and paint thinner and start really living here.

Adjusting

The insurance adjuster came out on Tuesday.  I had no idea what to expect, since we've never filed any kind of claim before.  She took a look at the damaged part of the ceiling we had exposed, noticed the laminate flooring was warped, took a couple of pictures, then told us the ceiling, laminate, tile floor, underlayment, and subfloor should all be replaced due to "blackwater contamination". 

I wanted to hug her.

She said she'd send us a letter soon.  She also explained to us that they have their own estimation process, so basically she'll just mail us a check.  If our repairs cost over the estimated amount or we find additional damage, we call her, she comes out to do a re-inspection, and we go from there.  She said if we do all the work ourselves for less than the estimate, we keep the change.  After 1 year from the date of the claim, if we haven't completed the repairs, we waive our right to any additional money for any additional damage found.  Sounds simple enough.

All-in-all, I am very happy with the process so far.  The adjuster was friendly, loved old houses, and complimented all the work we had done.  She was also understanding regarding the old damage; I'm sure she could tell it didn't happen just from that one incident, but because the water was contaminated and we had no way of getting to certain areas to dry them/disinfect, it was obvious to her that we had to get to the covered areas to at least disinfect. 

So...  We're tentatively planning a bathroom remodel for the spring.  Since the ceramic and underlayment should all come up, it would be stupid not to do the whole remodel at that point.  I'd love to do it now, but with a baby due in 6 weeks or less, I'm thinking we should probably wait...  I'd go a little nuts if there was anything else torn up and unusable right now.  We've already had to put our floor refinishing plans on hold because of all the unexpected vet bills.  We had a target amount for our savings account to be at when I started my time off work, and the loss of $800 and knowing we have incoming medical bills from Shayne's surgery kind of threw a wrench in things.  Oh well.  The floors will still be there in the spring.  And our room and the nursery aren't in dire need of refinishing anyways, so it's really no big deal.

Thanks, George!

Let me first say that George Bush is not my favorite person. I admire that he is a man of his convictions, and he will stick with them even when they become unpopular. I agree that something needed to be done about Saddam Hussein. But I think he acts without a lot of forthought or clear idea how his policies will affect our contry in the long run (which may just mean he has terrible advisors...). I think that this idea of giving everyone $600 to "stimulate" the economy is ridiculous. The problems are much deeper than people not having enough money to spend. Americans cannot and should not try to spend their way out of a crisis.

That said, I'm not really complainng that he's giving us $1200. Don't look a gift horse in the mouth.

That very nice $1200 rebate will buy about 1/2 of our cabinet project. We went to speak with the cabinet man last week, and we were very impressed with what we saw. Right in the center of his workshop was a beautiful, Craftsman-style island with inset doors and a wood countertop. Of course, the thing was the size of our entire kitchen, but we both fell in love. And we realized how much we really want frame-and-panel inset doors. The cabinet man was very patient with our indecision, telling us that a whole kitchen of those cabinets would run about $4500. Not bad, really, but WAY out of our price range. But what about just replacing the doors on the existing cabinets? That brought us down to a reasonable $2400.. It's still more than I wanted to spend, but it will give us the look we both adore, plus add more charm and character to our tiny little kitchen. It will look like Crown Point, without the huge price tag!

So, needless to say, we'll be pinching our pennies until we've saved enough for the transformation.

Which layout?

I'm literally driving myself nuts. No matter where I put the fridge, it makes a sort of tunnel. I'm used to the tunnel leading to the back porch (top of picture), so I'm having a hard time telling whether the fridge works best there because there's a little more room, or just because I'm used to it. Opinions??

Layout #1:

Layout #2:

Is this a good price for cabinets??

I've made a few calls to local cabinet makers, and I've had an extensive correspondance with one out of southwest Michigan (if we decide to work with him, I'll provide all relevant info). He's said he can replicate our original cabinets and is willing to work to tie in to the originals as well. Using paint-grade poplar plywood with solid doors he's quoting about $1600 without installation for 5 cabinets. Here is an illustration of the new cabinets. The originals are in gray, the new ones are white.

Also, if anyone has any comments on the layout, I'd be happy to hear them. The fridge will eventually be replaced with a counter-depth model. Unfortunately there's nowhere good to put it that won't make a tunnel of sorts. We're also considering recessing it between the studs, since the wall isn't load-bearing. As it stands, there's ~28" between the corner of the fridge and the chimney bump-out. The bump-out will be decreased by 2" when we remove the framing over the chimney and repair the plaster.

The dishwasher will be a 18" model, since I don't think a 24" will properly fit the opening. We'll see how it goes.

The 15" cabinet next to the sink will extend all the way back and will be fitted with some sort of sliding shelf mechanism to utilize the space.

More vintage stove dreaming

Ok. So I'm obsessed. Since yesterday I've been looking over websites and photos of stove restorations, fueled in part by the positive and encouraging comments I got on yesterady's post. And I decided that I was still really intimidated. But aside from that, I still really loved the idea of a vintage stove in my vintage kitchen. It would just add so much character that my plain-jane cabinets just might not provide.

I decided that a working stove, in good cosmetic shape, is what I needed to find. I talked the idea over with Shayne, and he was agreeable. To him, a stove is a stove. If it makes fire to heat up food, he's happy. Guys have life so easy.

After much browsing of craigslist and ebay, I found a stove. A cleaned up, unrestored, fully-working-with-some-parts-replaced stove. A 1941 B with high backsplash, timer, and lights. And it's affordable. Ain't she pretty?

I'm in contact with the seller, and I'll know soon what still needs to be done to bring this stove back to its original glory. I'm sure reporcelain of the burners and rechroming the top are in its future. It also needs an oven safety valve. But all of those are things that can be hired out for a reasonable cost. And I can do it bit-by-bit as we have the time and money (aside from the safety valve. That happens before we install the stove in the house.)

It kind of feels like everything for the kitchen is just falling together...

The "Can't Leave Well-Enough Alone" Club revisited

We have been discussing the merits of leaving the kitchen alone vs remodeling it as our next project. The big factor that makes us hate the kitchen is the carpet. Yes, carpet. And it's as disgusting as it sounds. I've cleaned it MULTIPLE times with the carpet cleaner, sometimes using just water to make sure all the soap is rinsed out. No matter what, the water comes up black. And with two dogs and two klutzes living here, there's no way it's going to stay clean, even if it had been to start with.

This prompted Shayne, with very little encouragement from me, to start ripping up the carpet as I was eating lunch. The conversation went something like this:
S: So you want the carpet ripped up?
D: Yeah, it's pretty nasty.
S: Now?
D: Not necessarily...
S: Huh. ::Starts cutting carpet with utility knife::

An hour later, after ripping up the carpet and a an OSB overlay, the kitchen looked like this:

Under the nasty carpet padding-covered adhesive, there's '50s linoleum. I guess the PPOs liked carpet in the kitchen so much, they did it twice... We found some remnants of '70s carpet around the edges. That must have been what was just glued over the lino.

We contemplated stripping the padding and adhesive off the linoleum. It was in pretty good shape, and it would be much easier to keep clean. We decided to check out Home Depot, just to see what kind of flooring options we could afford to lay down and rip out in a few years.

Option #1 was peel-and-stick tiles. They're much nicer than they used to be, but they're still cheap looking. At $.88 per square foot, though, the price is hard to beat. They wouldn't be at all easy to remove, though, so we kept looking. In the next aisle, we found floating laminate floors. We already have one laminate floor in the dining room, and I don't really like it much. It's noisy and cold, and it looks like fake wood. But... It was cheap ($24 for 25 square feet), it's easy to install, and it's easy to remove.

Guess what we bought?

For $130, we have a new floor that's moppable, decent-looking, and can be removed in a few years when we have the money to put down a real linoleum floor.

See?

It took both of us 6 hours to install. Considering we had no idea what we were doing, I don't think that's bad at all! We still need to get new toe-kick material for under the cabinets, and molding for aeound the edges, but it's pretty much done. How's that for quick and dirty?

Kitchen musings

I know, I know... I shouldn't even be thinking about the kitchen, what with the office and living room to finish. But unfortunately, or fortunately, I had a very good idea while I was visiting my Aunt Virginia the other day. I don't know why I didn't think of this before... Probably because it involves moving a doorway in a sort-of exterior wall, which would be a bit of a pain in the ass. However, I can't stop the wheels from turning, so here it is...

The first pic is the kitchen right now. The second is my newest idea. The large doorway into the kitchen is not original, and we're planning on closing it in no matter what. We've debated making it smaller instead of eliminating it, but either way, we need some wall there again to re-run the duct work for the office. Some of the duct is still in the wall above the doorway; the rest was removed when they made the opening. Walling in that doorway would really close in the dining room, so we might add some kind of window in the back wall. Not quite sure yet what we're doing there...

Next "weekend" will finally be a work weekend. Shayne and I have 2 days off together, so we should be able to accomplish something in that time. Since it will be nice out, my priority is the stairway and sanding the remaining few bits of woodwork.

The Kitchen Floor Plan Version 1.5

I dont' think that I like the first layout as much as I wish I did. There isn't enough under-counter storage space for pots and pans, and I'd like more counter space. I think we'll be able to use the original cabinets, but maybe not in their original configuration. We're going to have to either salvage or build others to match. We might even have to start from scratch, but I'm not going to worry about that quite yet. Let's get the floor plan settled first...

Here's the new-and-improved version...

I don't have time for a commentary right now(I actually just posted these now so that some friends and family could take a look), but I'll be psoting some thoughts about various layouts later on tonight...

Kitchen Layout Idea Version 1.0

After looking at the original cabinets out in the garage, I came up with a tentative kitchen layout. I mocked it up using the Better Homes and Gardens Home Designer, and I think that I like it. Since the storage configuration is so different, though, I'll need to do some more thinking to see if all of our stuff will fit in the cabinets.