Kitchen Remodel: Cabinet/Counter Finale

 

Hooray - Our final cabinet and counter pieces were delivered and installed!

Counter piece behind the range. We affectionately refer to it as "home plate"

 

Home plate, range hood and its shelf

I’m going to spare you the details of what it took to take delivery. Suffice it to say, there were delays, rework that needed to be done on the shelf, a mini-meltdown on my part, and more than a few four-letter words uttered. But by early afternoon on December 31, we were in business, including a working range hood.

We’ve installed hoods in the past without much trouble, but this one was a challenge. The biggest issue was its weight. After feeding the vent tubing up through the new shelf and installing the one end to the range hood, we used jacks to lift the hood up to the bottom of the shelf.

 

After that, David had to twist like a pretzel (again) to screw the back end in (whoever invented back belts should be canonized). The holes are tucked away in such a fashion that you really needed to be like Gumby to get at them. Once the hood was secure, we removed the jacks, and David secured the top of the vent tube to the exhaust pipe that he had previously installed. These three sentences make the whole job sound pretty easy, but it really took some time and energy to get this piece finished, not to mention dosing ourselves with a few Advil later in the day.

But finished it is and we couldn’t be happier. I know I’ve shown before and after shots before, but bear with me one final time.

We went from this…

 

…to this:

 

It's taken almost three months, but it's hard to believe it’s the same kitchen! Hopefully by the end of this month, we’ll have the glass bar top for the island and call this whole project a wrap. In the meantime, I've been cooking up a storm and will share pics and recipes really soon.

Kitchen Remodel: At Last! We Have Cabinets! We Have Doors!

Yesterday afternoon we took delivery of our cabinet doors. If you recall, we needed to send them back to the cabinet shop because there were various spots that needed to be filled with putty and sanded and/or needed some extra paint to for cosmetic purposes.

Of course, the process of getting the doors yesterday had its own little bit of drama. We got a call from the cabinet shop yesterday morning requesting us to stop by and take a look at the refinished pieces. Not a problem, especially as we were already in town.

When we arrived at the shop, we went out to the paint area to take a look at the work that had been done. While most of the doors looked okay, there were a few that still had some issues. For instance, on one door you could still see the putty. On others, there were still seams where no paint appeared. Simple enough to fix, but this being the third try to get them corrected, well, it was a little frustrating.

We came to find out that the guy who does all the paint work doesn’t like to be told what to do…by anyone. It wasn’t just our paint job, apparently it’s all paint jobs he works on. Sounds to me like it’s time to get a new paint guy.

However, to save ourselves and the cabinetmaker more frustration and more delays, we asked that the most obvious bits be corrected, then supply us with the paint to do the remaining cosmetic work ourselves. All parties came away reasonably satisfied, and we went home to await the arrival of our doors.

Later that afternoon, the pickup appeared bearing the doors and our two pieces of backsplash for behind the counters. Because all the holes had already been pre-drilled into the cabinets, it took little time to hang the doors. After the wood backsplashes were installed, the job – at this stage – was complete.

This morning David installed the door knobs…

 

…which match in design with the handles he already put on.

 

After that, he spent time using some fine brushes to do the cosmetic paint work.

Tomorrow work is supposed to begin on the building of the shelf that will go over the range and be the mount for the range hood, along with a counter piece that will cover the opening in back of the range. It would be nice to think that we might have these last elements in the next week, but we’ll see how things go. In the meantime, I will be getting to work this week painting the final bits of wall space in the kitchen area, and David will install the task lighting under the upper cabinets.

It’s certainly been an interesting journey getting to this point, but it’s been worth the wait.

Before:

 

 

After:

 

 

 

The kitchen area has exactly the open, airy feeling we were shooting for. Now it’s time to start cooking!

Kitchen Remodel: Always Look on the Bright Side of Life

Well we just got a call from the cabinetmaker’s wife letting us know that the cabinet doors won’t be showing up today. Apparently, it’s taking longer than expected to do all the putty work, sanding, and painting. The new delivery date is slated for Tuesday, December 11. I am now going to attempt assuming the Lotus position, take several deep, cleansing breathes, and murmur, “Oooommmm.”

On the high side, it means we have the house to ourselves until then and can kick back and relax. No sounds of drills, hammers, or saws. We can take naps this weekend and indulge in our cheese, dips, and bread snacks for lunch. Bronte and Olivia won’t have to be cooped up in one of the bedrooms while the workmen are here.

It also means this is the perfect opportunity to start humming this classic ditty from Eric Idle:

Always Look on the Bright Side of Life (from Monty Python)

Some things in life are bad
They can really make you mad
Other things just make you swear and curse.
When you're chewing on life's gristle
Don't grumble, give a whistle
And this'll help things turn out for the best...

And...always look on the bright side of life...
Always look on the light side of life...

If life seems jolly rotten
There's something you've forgotten
And that's to laugh and smile and dance and sing.
When you're feeling in the dumps
Don't be silly chumps
Just purse your lips and whistle - that's the thing.

And...always look on the bright side of life...
Always look on the light side of life...

For life is quite absurd
And death's the final word
You must always face the curtain with a bow.
Forget about your sin - give the audience a grin
Enjoy it - it's your last chance anyhow.

So always look on the bright side of death
Just before you draw your terminal breath

Life's a piece of shit
When you look at it
Life's a laugh and death's a joke, it's true.
You'll see it's all a show
Keep 'em laughing as you go
Just remember that the last laugh is on you.

And always look on the bright side of life...
Always look on the right side of life...
(Come on guys, cheer up!)
Always look on the bright side of life...
Always look on the bright side of life...
(Worse things happen at sea, you know.)
Always look on the bright side of life...
(I mean - what have you got to lose?)
(You know, you come from nothing - you're going back to nothing.
What have you lost? Nothing!)
Always look on the right side of life...

Kitchen Remodel: So Close, Yet...

Today we took delivery of our upper cabinets that now have shelves:

One might think that we would be dancing in the streets now that they're in place, huh? But take a look at the shots below. Notice anything missing?

Yup, all the doors. Turns out that when we were told that someone would come out and do any cosmetic touch-ups to the paint, it didn't mean some guy with a can of paint and an array of brushes. It meant bringing out a compressor, paint gun, and taking off all the doors so they could be painted in our back yard. That would be after filling a number of gaps we found with wood putty and then sanding it down. And did I mention that we were told today that the paint guy only has two speeds: low and slow?

It was painfully clear that there wouldn't be enough daylight left today to get it all done. So it was agreed that all the doors would be removed, taken back to the shop, prettied up, painted, and hopefully return here on Saturday. Sigh.

On the high side, I can start loading up the new upper cabinets and restore some semblence of organization to the kitchen. That's between times of shooing the cat from the open bottom cupboards.

Kitchen Remodel: The Cabinets are Here! The Cabinets are Here! (Kinda')

After weeks of waiting, hoping, making sacrifices to patron saints, and living in chaos, our kitchen cabinets were delivered on Friday.

I was hoping to have a post up before this, but things got a bit crazy between then and now. So let's step into the Wayback Machine to get a quick tour of what went down.

On Friday morning, we were asked to stop by the cabinet shop to take a look at all the pieces and parts that had been painted, varnished, sanded, and whatever other stuff that needed to be done, prior to delivery.

This will give you some idea of how many elements went into our cabinets. Between bases, doors, drawers, and counters, there were lots of wood.

To be honest, I had myself prepared to hear that the delivery would be delayed until this week and resigned myself to doing dishes in the bathtub for at least another three or four days. So, I was thrilled to hear that the delivery would take place that very day as planned.

Around 11:30, two big pickups rolled down the lane loaded up with most of the pieces. Once they got unloaded, it was time to do the installation. The first, and most critical piece, to go in was the cabinet run for the sink. If you remember, this was the section that was made four inches too long. With a bit of finagling, the reworked section went in perfectly.

The side counter went in place without incident as well.

Then came the island. The lovely, lovely, amazing island. After months of having such a tiny space for prep and plating, this is the piece that I love the most. There's so much room to spread out!

Here's a close-up of the end section where we have all our cutting boards and baking sheets. Nifty, huh?

When I saw the finished counters earlier that day at the shop, I almost swooned. Pictures don't do them jusctice. They are gorgeous.

Our installation guru then went to work screwing in all the hinges for the pull-out shelves in the island and attaching the cupboard doors. While he would have kept working until he couldn't stand, we were beat, starving as we had no lunch, and called things a day around 6 p.m.

Work got underway again around 8:30 the next morning. The hole for the sink was cut, the remaining hinges on the bottom cabinets were installed, and measurements were taken for the shelf unit that will be over the range. All that was completed by around 2:30.

The upper cabinets needed to go back to the shop, because the crew forgot to make and install the shelves. When your cupboards are about three feet high, a shelf or two might come in handy.

The next day, I loaded up the cabinets while David tackled the sink installation. The clips that came with the sink (they get mounted underneath to secure it, along with caulk) were too short. After rummaging around in his shop, he found four long bolts that did the trick. I make it sound simple, but it took quite some time to get those bolts in, plus connect all the plumbing. But by early afternoon, we had a working sink. No more doing dishes in the bathtub!

So now we are looking forward to having the upper cabinets delivered and installed tomorrow. Once that's done, there still the shelf that needs to be made for over the stove that will hold the range hood and a separate counter piece that will cover the back of the stove.

We're thinking that next week, David will take a trip to Chetumal, Mexico, with the cabinet maker's wife to order the glass bar top that will complete the island. More on that later. In the meantime, we can finish painting the walls and figure out when we want to buy and install the tile for the backsplash.

But while there's still all that to do, the difference is amazing. Remember, this is what we started with:

 

 

Stay tuned for more updates as we bring this project into the home stretch!

Kitchen Remodel: Primer Coat

Earlier today, David and I stopped by Mr. Kim's shop to see how things were going with our cabinets. In all the time we've been blogging about this project, it occured to me that I never posted a picture of his workshop.

I realize this shot doesn't clue you into any of the tools or machinery he has, but suffice it to say there is a lot of stuff in here, not to mention the random chicken or dog. OSHA would have a field day.

We found the crew were busy applying the primer coat to the cabinets, cupboards, and doors. Yippee!

Island base, drawers, and doors

Doors primed and drying, drawers waiting to be primed

 

Base of sink cabinet primed and ready for final coats

 

It's so exciting seeing all come together! Once the primer is dry, the crew will sand all the surfaces again, then apply the white paint and the satin poly finish. Because Monday was a national holiday celebrating Garifuna Day, our delivery date will probably be next week instead of this Friday. We should hopefully now for sure in the next couple of days.

 

Unless something unexpected crops up, we'll probably remove the existing sink cabinet on Monday, cut the existing plumbing, and do the cement pour in the tile voids. We're almost there!

 

You might also like:

 

• Plumbing the Depths of Insanity
• Cabinet and Tile Removal Continues
• Range Hood Vent & Electric

Kitchen Remodel: New Cabinets, Counters, Island Update

So on Wednesday I wrote about where we stand with our efforts in our kitchen project and had a bit of a crankypants rant because of not being able to get an update from our contractor. Well lo and behold, we received a call on Thursday from our contractor's partner asking if we could come by the shop on Friday afternoon to take a look at what they've been up to these last several weeks.

The first piece we looked at was the island and its countertop:

Side view of island and counter

This is a seven foot long run, which will provide ample work space. The counter is comprised of various local woods, which when cleaned up and varnished will take on a darker hue than what this shot suggests. The riser you see on the right side is part of the support for the glass bar top that we still need to have made. That is a story unto itself, which I'll share in an upcoming post.

While I couldn't get a good shot of the island from the front, you can see from our design that it will have three cupboard doors, behind which will contain pull out shelves. We also incorporated an open shelving unit on the right side for our cutting boards and baking sheets. Four drawers sit about the cupboards where I can store prep items and gadgets.

The crew also had been working on the cabinets that will run on either side of the range. Here's a shot of the smaller piece:

On both the long and short counters, they had laid out wood strips that were far lighter than what we asked for. There were also a number of very short pieces that broke the flow. Those will be taken out, and the blond pieces will be swapped out for darker ones. 

Another change we made was to rearrange some of the wood pieces on the long counter run. See the black/blond strip here in the middle? In person, it's really very pretty.

Well, apparently it's also very pricey. The way they had laid out the strips on the long counter run, pieces of this wood would be exactly where the sink would be, meaning they would all have to be cut out. Didn't seem to make much sense to us, which is why we asked to have the design rearranged.

In other news, the cupboard doors are in the process of being made:

The only change we made to the overall look was to have the inside edge to the frame be cut with a round edge versus a straight one.

The good news is that work is progressing and there's a possibility that painting the cabinets could start in the next couple of weeks. The bad news is that we still don't have an estimated finish date. We made it clear that we weren't looking for something written in stone, just a ballpark timeframe. Thanksgiving? Christmas? Easter? At least, Easter was taken off the table. But for whatever reason, there seem to be some commitment issues. 

So now we will see what information we can get from the owner, but have already been forewarned that he can be difficult to reach by phone and the times he is actually in the shop are erratic. Great.

In the meantime, we will press ahead and get whatever work we need to do out of the way, except for cutting the sink pipes and doing the cement work to cover the tile voids. I suppose worst case scenario is that the crew doing the cabinet work gets done before we have the plumbing and cement work finished. In that case, they'll just have to keep the cabinets in their shop until we're ready for delivery. One way or another, we'll get it figured out, but jeez, it doesn't seem to have to be this complicated.

Kitchen Remodel: Cabinet and Tile Removal Continues; Patience Being Tested

So after removing the first overhead cabinet and tile backsplash, we learned a few valuable lessons that got applied when work started on the second cabinet and tile area.

To reduce the amount of concrete dust from chipping off the tile and mastic and embedding itself into every crevice in the house, David put up some plastic sheeting around the work area.

To reduce the chances of having sharp pieces of tile and bits of concrete dust invade his eyeballs, especially as his eyes had just recovered from the fire ball incident, plastic goggles were worn.

And while no long-sleeve shirt was donned to prevent the appearance of being pecked to death by a flock of rabid chickens, gashes were all minor.

Our common sense knows no bounds.

In just a couple of days, the work was completed sans injury and much easier clean up.

Left upper cabinet removed, along with tile

Full view of wall minus cabinets and tile

There's still a bit of tile left around the window frame that needs to come off and some sanding to be done on the right side where the tile used to be. But other than that and some painting, this area is good to go.

At this point, the logical next step would be to tackle the bottom counter run. If you recall, we have some tile voids and sink issues to contend with And, call us crazy, but we would prefer to keep the days without running water in the kitchen to a minimum. 

But there’s just one small problem: we still have no idea when the new cabinets, counters, and island are scheduled for completion. We were supposed to have dates from the contractor two weeks ago. We were also told that we would be able to see the roughed out island, with its wood counter, this week, along with the sample cabinet door design. Emails have been sent, calls have been made, but we can’t seem to get any answers. 

We’re really trying to go with the flow here, but it's almost a month since we began this project and were given the expectation that work on the new cabinets would get underway in the same time frame. I know it's said that all good things come to those who wait, but for the love of Calphalon, can we just get some dates?

Signed,

Ms. Crankypants

Kitchen Remodel: Phase 1 of Cabinet & Tile Removal

With kitchen design plans and a down payment given to our contractor, Kim Longsworth, we decided to move ahead with removing the existing tile backsplash, the cabinet above the range, along with the small cabinet to the right of the range.

The small cabinet to the right of the range with the canisters on top

Having done various remodeling projects in our previous homes, we knew that at some point we would probably encounter an unexpected twist to our plans. It's sort of like being archeologists -- as you break through walls or tear up floors, you run across some weird implementation that a previous civilization (or in this case a homeowner or builder) probably thought was a genius solution to a problem. 

We didn't have to wait long to discover our first "genius move." When David removed that small cabinet next to the range, here's what we found:

There are no floor tiles under the cabinet. It was sitting on the cement pad.Oy!

But that made us wonder about the rest of the cabinets. After drilling a small(ish) hole in the base above the kick plate we found out, yup, the other run of cabinets has no tile underneath. That's actually not quite accurate. At the left end of the cabinets, there's a section about a foot and half wide. We could tell that it wasn't part of the rest of the run because it's slightly off level and there's a seam in the counter. Upon further investigation, we found that section is on tile, but had been sawed off to kinda', sorta' be even with the rest of the cabinets. Brilliant.

The only thing we can figure is that once the pad for the house was poured, the cabinets were installed, except for that last piece that got sawed off. Then the tile was put down around the cabinets. When the final counter piece was ready to be put in place, the light bulb went off that it would be too high. So, they chopped off the amount needed from the kick plate.

What all this meant was that we would now have the extra steps of filling the tile voids in with cement to get the surface area even for our new cabinets. That will mean two extra days we'll be without a sink, once the existing cabinets are yanked out and the cement pour done and allowed to set. Merde!

But as it wasn't a job we needed to tackle that very moment, David forged ahead with removing the tile back splash. Now when you're wielding a hammer and chisel, chipping into tile, pieces are going to start flying. And some of those pieces are going to ricochet off of and into the closest objects. Now if your body is one of those objects in the trajectory, guess what happens? Yup, you get cut. 

At one point during a break from tackling the tile, David walked out to the porch where I happened to be. I looked up and could have swore a pack of rabid chickens had been trying to peck him to death. He had blood running down his arms, his legs, even his feet. Fortunately, none of the cuts were deep. 

While waiting for his blood to clot, we went ahead and removed the cabinet over the range. No rest for the hen pecked. After stowing that in our spare room (there is really no other place to store it), we weren't surprised to discover that whoever painted the wall decided not to include the area behind the cabinet. 

Once all the tile was removed, it was time to call it a day. But not before doing some tidying up.

Minor kitchen chaos

Coming up: taking my turn with the hammer and chisel to chip off the cement that held the tile. How much fun does that sound?

Kitchen Remodel: Prep Stage Continues

While we were excited to purchase a new range and refrigerator, those were just baby steps to the prep work ahead of us to remodel our kitchen area.
 
A very big and important element was figuring out what we wanted our new kitchen to look like. We knew we wanted a bit more counter area, an island/bar to provide more prep and storage space, and have all the cabinetry in white to brighten up the room. After a bunch of brainstorming, David went to work designing a layout. 

Here's what we came up with:

Overhead view of new kitchen layout

Upper/lower cabinet specs for run left of the range

Upper/lower cabinet area to the right of the range

Island/bar detail; bar top to be in glass (we hope)

Cabinet door design

The next question was how much of this redesign did we want to tackle versus having someone else do it. We've remodeled two kitchens before this move, so we felt confident that we have the skills. But getting access to the materials we would need, well, that would be a real challenge. You're not going to find a Home Depot here in Belize, and there are few lumber yards in the Corozal area. The places that do sell wood often offer un-planed planks; mostly mahogany. And if you're in need of 2x4's, that is exactly what you will get -- honest to God 2x4's, un-planed. And more than likely, all of the hinges and pull-out extensions would need to be special ordered. Clearly, we needed to work with someone who had the resources and tools to pull this project off.

We heard really good things about Kim Longsworth of Bessa Decor. We got in touch with him and reviewed our plans over a couple of different sessions.  

It was during these discussions that we also needed to figure out what to do about countertops. We knew we didn't want marble, granite, or tile. A suggestion was made about considering concrete. I was initially leery of the idea, but did some research and was amazed at all the different finishes that could be had. Unfortunately, they can't be had here, plus there are no concrete masons in the area skilled to make the molds. We tossed out the idea of stainless steel counters, thinking it would make the area look too industrial.  Friends of ours, who also had their kitchen made by Mr. Kim, have wood counters like this:

We liked the warmth it brings to the white cabinets, so we ended up going down that road. What we ultimately decided to do was eliminate the light and blond wood elements and stick with darker pieces of varying lengths; no shorter than 24 inches, no longer than 40 inches. With a couple of coats of a poly finish, the counters should be uber-durable.

With those big decisions out of the way, we gave Mr. Kim the go-ahead (not to mention a down payment) to start the job. In the meantime, we had our own work to do including finding a single-basin kitchen sink and range hood, removing all the existing cupboards and backsplash tiles, tidying up the kitchen sink plumbing, moving electrical outlets, and the list goes on.

In upcoming posts, we'll provide more details on some of the diagrams you've seen here, the quest for our new sink and range hood, the compromises needed for the glass bar top, plus take you on our journey through semi-organized kitchen chaos.