Ok - we hit a snag

So I'm hesitant to admit this as things were going so swimingly, but we finally hit our snag.... And it was a big one. Thankfully though, we weren't the ones who screwed up and so we aren't footing the bill to fix it. If we play our cards right we may even save money since unfortunately our timeline is getting pushed out. So what is the problem you ask? See photo #2. The dishwasher hits the oven drawer handle and the drawer from the cabinet opens into the dishwasher handle. That whole corner is just screwed up. And of course we realized it when appliances were installed and counters were about to be ordered.

Thankfully, without too many bumps along the way, we are in the process of getting it fixed. It's my kitchen #2 as my contractor says. He has to rearrange and/or replace all but 2 base cabinets. But I think it's going to be alright. I'm crossing fingers that there won't be a kitchen #3.

On the brighter side, if you just look at my kitchen it's beautiful!!

In the meantime. I've been busy painting lots of sample colors on the walls. I think I may have finally figured it all out (thanks Aunt Tina!!). Or at least the first floor anyway. It only took about 10 different samples from sherwin Williams to find the right ones!

Now that I have almost fully functional use of my house again, I need another week to organize it all!

Countdown to kitchen!

I tend to be a bit of a pessimist and don't get truly excited about many things, but today I am so excited I think I might burst.

We've got drywall on the walls, lights in the ceiling and a pretty new subfloor. Now we need some cabinets. And they are coming. Tomorrow. At 7 am.

Who delivers cabinets at a time when somedays I'm actually still asleep! But to be fair, the driver did call and ask. Since the contractor was already planning on coming at 7, I suppose it's not much different.

So if all goes as planned, I'll be cooking again next week and I couldn't be happier!

 Construction chic rocks ;)



The dining room in it's current state



A little sneak peak of the backsplash and counter



Here it is!  Right before cabinets.



Progress update

I guess we hit Thanksgiving and just never looked back. It was interesting prepping on a folding table in the middle of the living room. Actually, the name of that room has been under discussion a lot lately after I told C to get something from the living room and his response was "which one?". In my house growing up we had the living room and the little room which was actually a bedroom. So now we'll have the room off the kitchen with the fireplace and built-ins and then the room with the sofa and the TV. What would you call them?

On Thanksgiving weekend we spent a day putting up the outdoor Xmas lights and had a blast! I was so thrilled to have this wonderful house to decorate..even if it's just the outside for now. It happened to be a beautiful day and a bunch of neighbors stopped by to say hi. One even brought a little welcome gift. I think we chose a good neighborhood!

And then finally, early last week they took the kitchen out. I posted some of the before pics... So now we've got running water in the utility sink in one room, the fridge in the room-to-be-named and my food in other-room-to-be-named. It's challenging but hasn't been as bad as I expected.

So of course I figured it'd be a great idea to have a few family and friends over for Cs birthday on Friday...... What was I thinking???

To be clear - this is the before picture

"Before" with the view from the family room (I guess that's what we're calling it)

Prepping for Thanksgiving. 

Little by little

And we have closets! Two out of five ain't bad.....for now. The foyer closet is perfect (now if I could just get it perfectly organized) and I love this new closet organizer I discovered. Cameron's closet is now built to hold most of our clothes until we can figure our our strange small, master closet situation. Our bedroom feels like a room now and less like a giant closet full of moving boxes.

We have a design plan coming together for the kitchen. It might look a little something like this. I just have to track down that backsplash tile, pick a counter and some lighting. My vision is starting to come together for the kitchen.

The master bath; however... is a whole other story. We're stuck trying to come up with a layout, much less a design.

Of mice and (wo)men

We had an exciting weekend. My wonderful Aunt was kind enough to spend practically all day helping me clean. I am so grateful for the help. I finally felt like we are getting through all the layers of dirt. It's a good feeling.

That good feeling went out the window when I watched a mouse scurry across my dining room floor. I was unpacking the box labeled "booze" at the time. Coincidence? Or Boozy the mouse? You decide.

Kitchen cabinets were ordered today. I'm getting excited. Finally.

Everything including the kitchen sink

It's been fun trying to figure out how to do the dishes (now that I'm actually generating some) without working sink/faucet. We've been going old school with dish basins that we fill from the utility sink because, yes, that IS cleaner than my kitchen sink. Or at least it was. My wonderful hubby decided to tackle that project tonight. And what a difference it made! Next up..... closets!

Before - a pile of rust that used to be in the inside of the faucet

After!  An old faucet that we brought from the old house does the job.

I didn't even realize they still sold dish basins.  Lucky for me they do!

Bathroom demo day 1

Bye-bye gross ugly tiles-falling-off-the-wall canary yellow master bath!!!! Once our contractor pulled off the vanity we discovered that they hacked up the old vanity in order to build it on top of the rise of the stairs, so our redesign options just got really limited. Either that or we have to get super creative!! Alex says he has plan.....

But the best find of the day was the balled up newspaper behind the walls with want ads from 1968 requesting 'male help wanted' or 'female help wanted'. Oh how far we've come.

What did we do?

Today found me scrubbing light switches with a lysol and a toothbrush making me wonder if I really knew what I was getting myself into when we bought this house.  There are layers upon layers of dirt.  I don't even know where to start between the cleaning, the unpacking, setting up the rooms that are livable, and finding a way to live in the ones that aren't....  at least until we remodel them.  We definitely have our work cut out for us.  Stay tuned!