kitchen progress

I feel like I have talked about the kitchen remodel a lot. So bear with me if I say something I have already said a million times.  

In June, we went to Lowe's and designed our new kitchen.  The cabinets and countertop in the house are so old and out-dated and not in good condition.  There is also no space for me to put food (if you know me, you know I keep a WELL-stocked pantry...it's an addiction).  So new kitchen it was.  I did not realize how expensive, tedious, and labor-intensive it was to remodel a kitchen.  Especially when we Matt is doing all the tearing out and installation.

After much, much, much debate and back and forth we decided on Kraftmaid cabinets (which I usually unintentionally call Kraftaid or Kitchenmaid).  We went with a painted maple door which they called "Mushroom". It's basically off-white, but really warm. The door style is Alexis.  This style comes in the full-overlay design.  Here is a definition of it since I just tried 5 separate times to explain it, but erased them all...

"Full overlay doors have less than one-eighth of an inch between them—in effect, they fully lay over the cabinet. Frameless cabinets always have full overlay doors but some framed cabinets have them as well. You can tell for sure whether a cabinet is framed or frameless by opening a door and checking for rails and stiles."

Here is the door style. I couldn't find a picture of our door style with the Mushroom color.

Imagine this door style, but Mushroom color. Kind of like the light part of a Portobello.  How's that for a visual?  

Full overlay is a little more expensive than partial overlay, but looks soooo much nicer overall.  It's a much sleeker and streamline look.  These doors/drawers also has the "soft close" feature which I talked about in the previous post.  I love that.  We still need to buy the knobs and that will definitely make the kitchen more put-together (and make it easier for me to open the dang doors!)

The new cabinets are so beautiful! The kitchen looks amazing already and we don't even have the countertop or new sink in.

Countertop company came today to measure and gave us a final quote on the material. I am so excited because we last minute decided to put a 4 inch backsplash all the way around instead of just a 3 inch on one side of the kitchen and she threw it in at no extra cost! We went with LG Hi-Macs which is similar to Corian if you've heard of that.  No laminate and no granite.  The LG Hi Macs is perfect.  The color is called Mocha Granite so it is a rich brown with specks of other colors.  It will go great with the Mushroom cabinets, cherry hardwoods, and Homestead Resort Parlor Sage walls (can you tell I like saying that word?).  We also ordered a brand new stainless steel sink which will be integrated into the new countertops.  It will be a smooth connection where the counter will butt up right to the sink.  It looks so  awesome.  The sink is a 70/30 sink so one side is bigger than the other.  It is the deepest, biggest sink that I will ever have.  I am so used to the manufacture dinky stainless steel ones that have been in all the places we've rented.  We also bought a new faucet to install and it's fancy to me.  Once again, because anything new in a kitchen is fancy to me.

Huge semi that delivered the cabinets to me last week 

Old cabinets..you may not be able to tell, but they are falling off the hinges.

Before: sink and sink base

Before- above stove area

New cabinets filled our garage

My pantries!!

Just a little Friday night demolition 

1st new cabinet in!

After: above stove. Still need our new microwave and knobs...and paint and trim etc.

Big ole corner cabinet on the wall that previously had NO cabinets

Matt's electrical work.  He moved this outlet which was originally on the lower part of the chair rail up here. Don't ask me how he did it.  I just nod and say "Good Job!" Where does he get this from?

Sunday night after I got home from work we installed the final pieces...the pantries!

We just watched.  He stayed between my feet the whole time.  Until I was enlisted to help.

Ta-Da! Well, almost.  Still a lot of work to be done, but they are installed!

When you give a nurse a power drill...

She will scream every time it turns on.  That's a scary tool!

BUT I helped.

And then I loved on him :)

Matt worked SO hard this weekend getting all of the cabinets in.  I am so proud of my handy-man!

the part where we moved

Yes, it's been a week and a half now that we moved, but I am just now getting around to plugging in my printer and uploading photos. Whoops!

The weather was not very conducive to moving .  We were right in the middle of a heat wave...wait-why are they calling it a heat wave when all of July has been 90+degrees with a heat index of 100+? It is still that hot, so waiting to move would have done us no good.  We just had to suck it up and get it done.  Plus, would I rather have moved in January in the snow? Nope. Complaining stops here.

Massive Uhaul...the guy went to hand me the keys and the look on my face must have said it all. No WAY am I driving that thing.  We got the 26' truck and filled it the edges.

Moving day!

Getting out of the condo...on to bigger and better things :)

My super handsome and strong hubby

Matt's friends Troy and Tracy came to help us (so did Matt's mom).  I don't know what we would've done without them!  It made for a lot less heavy lifting for me :) 

Jax being a weirdo and knowing something is up

Say "goodbye" to condo life doggie! Your huge fenced in backyard awaits you!

pathetic...in an undeniable cute way

the boys

Now that we are all moved, it is such a relief to know that moving is not in our near future.  We plan on being in this house for awhile. Yes, things change but this house is a house we can grow in to. I am so happy to be a homeowner!

reconnected to the WWW

Ladies and Gents, we have been reconnected to the outside world. AKA internet and TV.  To be completely honest, it has actually been a small, tab bit...nice without TV this week.  Don't get me wrong, I really missed my Real Housewives ladies (all of them, but mostly Jersey), The Big C, Sookie and Bill (True Blood), and Weeds; but it was actually nice to get stuff done.  I watch some pretty classy shows if you can't tell...not :).  I don't think I would not have gotten as much unpacked.  Plus, Matt and I sat out on the porch Thursday night when he got home from work and it was amazing.  Sitting out on the porch of our new house that we finally got moved into.  SO awesome.  

So I know you may be expecting a blog post of the house post-move-in.  Wellll not so. The house is no shape to be photographed.  Let me unpack a little more first :)

Big news...we have started the remodel of our kitchen! Cabinets arrived on Thursday afternoon and Matt spent the day today tearing out the old cabinets, re-routing the electrical outlets to make room for the whole new set of cabinet that are going on a now empty wall, shimming (is that the right term Matt?) the walls, and installing most of the NEW cabinets!! Isn't he a jack-of-all-trades? He amazes me. I had to work today, but when I got home I walked into a completely different kitchen. It was so exciting.  All the old is out and most of the new is in.  I absolutely love the color and the look of the new cabinets.  The counter-top peeps come on Wednesday to do measurements for the counter-top which will come in in another couple weeks.  I can't wait to see our new kitchen sink.  It's a 70/30 sink where one side is bigger.  It's also really deep so I'll be able to wash big pots in there and not hit it all over the faucet.  Random? I'll have to wait until they come to install the counter tops though.  And to add on the cool faucet we bought and the fancy schmancy water filtration system.  This stuff makes me giddy.  All this planning, picking out, and energy will soon be a reality and it's really testing my patience to wait for it all to be done!

Tomorrow, Matt is planning on installing the rest of the cabinets and painting the kitchen.  Homestead Resort Parlor Sage.  Yes, that is the name of the color of our kitchen.  Quite dramatic huh? We then got on the topic of how they pick out names of paint colors. Kind of how our cabinets' color is called "mushroom". Which actually makes perfect sense when you look at them.  

We still need to buy the knobs to go on the cabinet doors, but we just haven't had a chance.  Speaking of cabinet doors, do you want to know something super-duper cool about these? They have a feature called "soft-close" so even if you go to slam a door/drawer, they won't.  It closes like normal until the very end and then it catches itself and slowly goes in the rest of the way.  It's like magic! That way you are never slamming the door.

Here is a sneak peek of a corner cabinet...in poor quality, iPhone form.  This cabinet is on the 2 walls which previously had no cabinets and we are adding two big pantry cabinets and other base cabinets and countertop to all the way around.  

I apologize if this post is random and neurotic, but it's 11 pm and I really should be asleep so I will be able to wake up at 5:30 am and function at work tomorrow.  Can't wait to the progress tomorrow!

MIA

Just in case you were wondering where the heck I've been...we aren't getting our Internet reconnected to the new house until this weekend. So I just haven't felt like blogging from my iPhone (which I'm doing now and it kind of stinks).

QUICK update-

-We are moved in. Yes!
-Are we unpacked? No way!
-Do I feel absolutely unsettled? Yep.

Plan for this week (squeezed in on my 1 day off that's left):

-Unpack. If even just a little.

That's about it. I'll return soon!

sink or swim

This past weekend was sink or swim.  Either we get everything done at the new house so it'd be ready to move in next weekend or we don't...and we have to move in anyways.

Well, we swam! Everything got done this weekend.  Although this has been a long and exhausting process, I am actually going to miss doing these weekend projects with Matt.  I know there is still a lot of work to be done eventually, but it's just been fun doing this together. The only thing we have left is the kitchen.  The cabinets are supposed to be in on the 28th and then will begin the demolition of the old kitchen and the re-installation of the new and improved kitchen! Once we rip out the cabinets and counter-top, we (I say "we", but it will really be more Matt) will paint the kitchen, install the new cabinets and then wait for the counter-top company to come install the counters after we are done.  We bought the faucet and an under-sink water filtration system this weekend.  Matt says I can't put a PUR water filter faucet adapter on a brand new nice kitchen (like we have now)...so under-the-sink system it was.  We will have a separate faucet head that will dispense the filtered drinking water.  How cool is that?  

We finished ALL the painting this weekend.  The very last rooms were completed.  Saturday, we primed and later painted the laundry room, love love loved the color so we painted the upstairs bathroom the same color, painted the spare bedroom, master bath, and lastly finished the 1/2 bath downstairs on Sunday.  It feels so nice to have everything painted and beautiful.  I LOVE it!  For the record, compliment my painting job on the 1/2 bath downstairs every chance you get... I NEVER want to have to paint that again.  That was the most pain-staking room to paint ever in the history of rooms. 

Finished living room. The grey looks way different here.

Starting to cut-in the laundry room with primer

All primed and ready to go!

Cutting in with the fabulous purple.  

I love it! This actually ended up being one of our favorite colors that we did in the whole house.  Of course it looks different in these pictures.  It's so cool! I love my purple laundry room! Can't wait to see those stainless steel washer/dryer in here with the color :)

Yay!

Cutting in the 2nd bedroom

My handsome handyman :)

All done! Ready for the black and white bedding and furniture.

Cutting in the master with the same color

We loved the purple from the laundry room so much that I extended it upstairs to the spare bath

Hanging light fixture...now fixed 

My BFF when it comes to cutting in the rooms 

We stayed until 2 am on Saturday and then got a little rest before going back at it on Sunday.  On Sunday my Dad, Ann, Janet, and Daniel our nephew stopped by the house.  We visited for a quick minute and then it was back to work.  Janet got to work too (as always).  She gathered up all of the blinds and took them out in the backyard to hose off, scrub, and lay out in the sun to dry.  Those blinds were gross.  So dusty.  Now they look brand new and sparkling.  She is so so great.  She always steps up to the plate and gets stuff done.  I think we get along so well because we are so similar. 

While she got the blinds clean, Matt was upstairs installing our new closet system (with Daniel's "help" of course) and I was downstairs picking up all the painting tarps, trash, empty paint cans, odds and ends;  replacing light switch plates; sweeping, vacuuming, swiffering the floors; and windexing and lysoling everything else.  It smells so good in there. The house is now spotless just in time for the move in.  Yes, I know it will get messy again during the move, but I just HAD to have the house clean before we left.  I needed all evidence of the remodel (ignoring the still-needing-to-be-done kitchen of course) to be out of sight so we could just enjoy our new house next weekend.  Light fixtures are back on the walls, mirrors are hung, and the laundry room is ready for the new washer/dryer.  No more drywall dust on the floor and windowsills, no more empty paint cans, no more tarps or cardboard boxes on the ground; just shiny hardwood and freshly vacuumed carpet :).

Here is the closet progress...

Before...one old metal rack and cedar on the wall

Matt ripped out the cedar boards and repainted that section

The beginning of the new closet system!

This closet was more complex than I thought. First, we had to plan out how we wanted it. One row, two rows, shelving, corners, how far 2nd row comes across to be able to hang long stuff, on and on and on.  Then, we had to measure everything to know exactly how much of the racks we would need and how high it needed to be to accommodate our clothes.  They sell them as huge long pieces and then you cut it to size.  Matt had to have all the measurements before he went so he could have it cut there.  No truck anymore=work with what you've got.  You also have to buy all the mounting pieces, joiner plates, end caps, support bars, corner turns, etc.   What would I do with my husband?

The start of the row of 5 shelves on the inside wall

Hand-sawing to get just right

TaDa!! Isn't it beautiful?! I LOVE it! I can't wait to hang up our clothes in there.

Corner turn and tie/belt rack

On Sunday evening, Matt and I went to Best Buy to finally buy our new washer and dryer.  The ones we wanted (and have researched for forever now) were on sale online.  Yes! But, once we got inside the store and I spotted them the price tag was different.  The pair was on sale for even lower than online. Double yes! We also got free delivery, installation, and old pair haul-away ($90 value), 10% off one of the storage pedestals, and 20% off extra warranties that we bought.  Plus, since we are paying them off right away from our Best Buy card, we got a ton of Reward Zone points which will come out to being a $120 gift card in the mail.  Perfect to buy our over-the-stove microwave with! I have never been so excited in the my life to do a load of laundry. 

glorious!

We left on Sunday night with the house looking like a home.  We both looked at each other with huge grins like "This is our house and we are almost living here".  I just can't wait.  I work Monday-Thursday this week, finish packing (yikes!) on Friday and then we move on Saturday bright and early. My mom is actually moving this weekend too. Kind of stinks that it worked out that we are moving the same weekend. I know she really wants to be here to help.  She will get down soon enough!  We've got Matt's mom and couple of Matt's strong friends coming to help us move.  Bring it on!

I just had to include this picture of Jax.  It cracks me up the way he is sitting and hiding in here.