The kitchen AKA worst project ever.

Our kitchen. I'm going to be human and admit I'm OVER IT. I'm tired of grilled chicken and no stove top and no dining room. I know things happen during any and all reno's but I think I'm just done with the whole renovating lifestyle. I'm ready to just have some breathing room. & honestly I can't keep eating Steak and Shake, it's going to kill me (but its soooo goood). I thought the kitchen would be easy. New walls new floor cabinets appliances YEA ENJOY!! Not so much what actually happens (I should also know this by now right?)

So where did we leave off? Oh yeah, the roof line.

So now we have beams in the kitchen that are putting pressure on the beam that has been laid across the kitchen ceiling.

The hope is that it raises the roofline just enough so that things are straight. It's probably been a week or so now? It's moving up - but it's still a process that takes time.

So while we're waiting for this whole thing to happen some issues on the outside of the house started happening. There's some rot at the base of the house, where the house meets the ground. We have cement poured at the weird little side porch there but the rotting wood poses a problem with the foundation and all of that super fun stuff. SO - having a little bit of concrete poured to help THAT situation. Ok, cool.

THEN there's what I like to call the Siding Slip Up. When the addition was built, white vinyl siding was put up over the wood siding. Fine, no big deal. Except the electric was under the siding. & it is kind of just a big mess. Also a massive fire hazard because of how it was installed.

There is a group of wires that runs directly into the ground. Not really sure where they go, thats the next part we have to figure out. House renovation - always a barrel of fun!

^^^^ is the side of the house without any white vinyl siding. That is all original wood siding. It looks gross but its actually in good shape, just really dirty. Right now the siding will stay off until the electrical issues are taken care of and then we'll go from there. 

Come on kitchen - I believe in you!!

Glass block excitement!

We had glass blocks installed at the house. Its actually really nice to know the basement is solid as far as water getting in (or critters). They look great and have added a nice little upgrade to the farmhouse.

Im actually pretty excited about it. Something about having a more secure basement makes me really excited. Our basement is a real deal Michigan basement, all concrete and rock. Anything I can do to keep things from getting in Im cool with. 

Also took some of the siding down because we will be putting a beam through the kitchen ceiling and there's a chance it will go all the way across the house. Looking pretty shabby over at the farmhouse lately lol!!

I'm enjoying the original wood siding though! Pretty neat. 

It's like Mario Brothers over here.

As with any reno little things happen outside of the actual process taking place in order to complete the project as a whole. So all the pipes are being observed in the basement so we can figure out which lines will go to a dishwasher, sink, line for the stove, etc. During this process it was discovered there were many pipes that served no purpose. Interesting no? Pipes that went nowhere and pipes that were capped off entirely.

The decision was made to take out all the useless pipes. I mean, why not. They don't need to be there. & there was one pipe that T & I hit our head on nearly constantly & that one NEEDED TO GO. So now it's like Mario Brothers over here, pipes everywhere. At least they are OUT.

Roxy is ever curious about this house. Probably wonders on a constant basis what the heck is going on around here and why there are things everywhere. 

Kitchen remodel - Phase two

Now the super awesome fun times part: really pulling out the walls and ceiling. We have a classy tarp up now completely cutting off our kitchen from the rest of the house. The dust and grossness of the demo is insane so Id like to keep as much of it out of the house as possible, obviously.

Quick recap of where we are currently at. The ceiling tiles have been removed but there is still more ceiling to take out. We also have to tear out the plaster walls and all the lath and insulation that's there.

Now the side walls (which are plaster and lath) are going to start to come down. The window wall plaster literally crumbles if you even touch it. The right wall, which is also our bathroom hallway, should be pretty easy to clean out. The other side is already drywalled so hopefully there wont be much of an issue there. The left wall is paneling. So that will come down, we'll pull off that plaster and then the lath underneath. Hurray.

Tear down of the ceiling went pretty well. We have run into a bit of a problem because we were hoping to gain more height. Our roof line slopes down (not sure how we didn't notice that before) so now we have to figure out how cabinets are going to work. It'd be REALLLLLLY nice to have some more height, but what can you do. 

& then, there's this wall. 

Troy was tearing out this wall when a mom and her dozen baby mice, still attached to her, fell out of the wall. Nope. Done. I can handle a lot of things, I really can, but not mice scurrying around in my house. Cannot do it. Before we could sweep her up and put her outside she found a hole in the floor and now resides somewhere in the basement. We have traps everywhere. Even more important to seal off the rest of the house - those things aren't getting near me!!!

So after that I mainly was the clean up crew, while Troy continued tearing things out. I couldn't be in there without thinking something was going to fall on me. VALID!!

We got pretty far. The right and left walls are gone and gutted. All's that left is to move the radiator (somehow), get the sink out of there and tear that entire wall out. 

We have run onto a little problem (& there's always at least one isn't there??). The roofline is a little shotty. There's some pieces falling off (you can see the ply wood from the roof directly above the wood slats) and we're going to have to do something to fix it.

At best we replace the entire kitchen roof and raise the slope. At worst we put in supports and jack it up a little to make it stay put. No water is getting in that we can tell. & after how bad the winter is, we're pretty sure we're good on it being dry. However, we have to make a decision on what to do with this. 

& Roxy was just mad we wouldn't let her help!!

Kitchen remodel - Phase one

It's hard to believe we are THIS CLOSE to having a new kitchen. We have never had a completely new, designed by us, kitchen. So it's pretty exciting to literally say "this is what we want". That being said, we have to start from the beginning and gut the old kitchen. We moved all of our things (small appliances, pots & pans, glasses, etc.) into our dining room. Hooray - more demo!!

Original kitchen: (this photo is from when we first bought the home)

This is what we've been living wtih for the past month or so. It was pretty functional. Dishwasher has never worked but Im OK with washing four things a day. & no, our fridge isn't blue - we never took the wrapping off, knowing we would be remodeling. 

From what we can tell the cabinets, except for the doors I would guess, were all handmade and hung probably by the homeowner. Behind the grate in the back left is a MASSIVE radiator. Weighs literally probably as much as an elephant, so that might be a chore to get out.

Let's start the demo!

I could not WAIT to get that wood paneling off - it's one of the last places in the house that has it! The closet off of our guest room has some as well, but its a lighter color. 

We found some treasures in the ceiling. We think someone liked hiding their things up in the rafters. We couldn't help and laugh at it! I love finding things like this.

Next up - taking out the ceiling and walls (i.e. HUGE MESS)......