Oh, hello! I have to admit there’s not much to report, reading-wise. I finished this:
…and will now move on to the last book of the Ender Saga. My son is almost done with it, and he has The Shadow Saga (a related storyline to Ender) ready to go. Meanwhile, I’ve slowly been returning books to the library unread (because the library seems to want them back.) After I finish the Ender Saga, I might take a break from Orson Scott Card (temporarily) and read some of the other books I had planned on this summer!
Eating-wise, I made this Vegetable Korma, and served it with naan from Trader Joe’s.
And, inspired by Suzanne,, I made a stir fry with this Szechuan sauce. It was delicious, but after this meal my husband announced that he never wants to see tofu, broccoli, or rice again. I guess we do need to branch out a bit.
So let’s talk about the kitchen! We’ve lived in this house twenty years, and although we did change out the appliances along the way, we still have the original cabinets and countertops. They’ve been in pretty bad shape for several years, but my husband and I were not in agreement about how to proceed, so we just lived with it. Finally, the situation became dire, my husband and I quickly got in agreement, and the new cabinets are coming next week, woohoo! Followed by countertops and then a new backsplash.
My husband is determined to do the demolition himself, and he’s already started.
First of all, our kitchen is tiny (sigh.) There’s not much we can do about that, but we had this weird cabinet that ran perpendicular to the oven. It did give a little more counter space, but made the kitchen even smaller, and having more than one person trying to cook at one time was enraging.
The new design will just have cabinets continuing in a straight line after the oven. Meanwhile, underneath the ripped out counter was this:
Someone apparently put tile over laminate flooring, and THEN someone put another layer of tile over that. Luckily, when we moved into the house there were extra tiles in the garage, and we still have them! My husband is in the process of tiling over the gaping hole in the floor. OR, we could just tear up all the tile and go with the original laminate. JUST KIDDING! It’s so hideous. Although I’m sure it looked lovely when it was new, in the 1970s.
I’m not sure what meals are going to look like for the next couple of weeks…. it’s going to be challenging. We’re planning to do some meal prep this weekend, and then hopefully we’ll at least have the stove available most days to heat things up. I see some Bolay and Chipotle in our future!
How long have you lived in your house? Have you done any major kitchen projects?
22 Responses
Yay for an updated kitchen! I am so impressed that your husband just jumped right into demolition! And how fortunate you saved the tile! I love your palimpsest of flooring too – a little time capsule.
We have lived in our house for twelve years and have never done a renovation!
We had the Szechuan stir fry last night. So good! I’m glad you tried it (and thanks for the shout out!).
Well, thanks for linking to that recipe! I get all my best dinner ideas from you and Birchwood Pie.
Yes, I felt like an archaeologist digging through those layers of floor. I liked imagining what each layer looked like when it was brand new, and what the people were thinking who installed it. It’s kind of fun!
I feel you! Our kitchen is mostly original 1960s so it’s long overdue for a reboot. If you want to see what original 1960’s laminate without two layers of new flooring over it looks like, I can help with that! The hubs talks a good game about moving forward and I’m a fan of the “living with it” approach simply because I get overwhelmed by all of the decisions. We’ll see.
Well, if your kitchen is still functional I would probably want to live with it too. Parts of ours was literally rotting away- two of the cabinet drawers just collapsed, leaving us with one drawer in the entire kitchen. And the countertop is wearing away- I’ll eventually post a “before” pic, which will probably make everyone scream.
There is tile under our stove (the rest of the kitchen has wood floors) that is cracking and chipping and just plain missing in certain places and if I had a million dollars, the very first thing I would fix is the kitchen floor. Forget the essentially useless bathroom upstairs. Forget the garage that’s going to collapse the next time a gust of wind hits it. I want to fix the kitchen floor. So yay! for a kitchen remodel. Eating IS going to be a challenge, but you can do it!
I assume that you guys weren’t the ones to put down the wood floor! It’s interesting to see how people cut corners. I mean, why not just move the stove and put the wood floor throughout the ENTIRE kitchen??? At least I’m assuming this isn’t something you can see- you just know it’s there.
We’ve lived in our house for almost 6 years and have been renovating basically non-stop the whole time. Sigh. I hate decisions and I hate renovations and I hate all the money and chaos. But…for the most part, we really needed to do all of it. Major excavating to deal with a broken sewer pipe and drainage issues; removed a rotten carport and entryway, removed four huge trees, dealt with a horrible, smelly basement, installed windows that were to code, dealt with some interior plumbing issues.
We’ve come so far and I know our house is worth a lot more than when we bought it…but I also sometimes wish we had gone with a more expensive home to start with that didn’t require so much work (to be fair, a lot of the things that we’ve had to deal with, we weren’t aware of when we bought the place).
BUT, we haven’t done a single thing in our kitchen. It’s a bit dated, but very functional and other than maybe painting the cupboards at some point, I don’t know if we’ll ever do anything in that space? That said, we have an apartment sized-fridge because it’s the only thing that fits under the current cupboard configuration and it’s likely 20+ years old? So when that dies, we might need to remove some upper cupboards to accommodate a larger fridge. No gonna lie – I would enjoy having a bigger fridge!
Well, I can see why, with all your other renovations, you wouldn’t be anxious to renovate a fully functional kitchen! We put it off for a very long time. And trust me- when the kids are older, like when Levi is a teenager, you will DEFINITELY need a bigger fridge!
You are lucky that your hubby is able to do the work. I had to hire out but it was so worth it… love my new cabinets, countertop and floor. We also got rid of 2 layers of wallpaper.
Good luck.
We’re hiring out for the really hard stuff. And we’re not getting a new floor, but we’ll probably get this tile and grout professionally cleaned- so hopefully it’ll look new. And thanks- I have a feeling we’ll be needing a lot of luck with this.
It’s awesome that your husband is handy enough to do this himself. Because kitchen remodels are $$$$$$!! When we house hunted for our current home, it took over 2 years to find the one we bought because we wanted to avoid a kitchen remodel/other renovations. We moved in late in 2019z We are NOT handy so would have to pay for a contractor. The homes in our neighborhood are mostly from the 1920s so lots need work. Ours was flipped back in 2008 so didn’t need anything major. I would love to paint our cabinets white but it is expensive to do so and would be so disruptive. But maybe I can talk my husband into doing it in a couple of years and we can go on vacation while the work is done.
Ugh, it is SO disruptive!!! My husband has hit all sorts of snafus just while trying to tear out the old cabinets, and as a result a handyman will be arriving Monday to help. It’s a nightmare!
Ah, love the three layers of flooring! My son just discovered that when they demo’d a bathroom in their new (old) house.
We did a major kitchen reno a few years ago. Took everything down to the studs, took out a wall to the dining room and started from scratch. It was a long process but I still love the results!
Wow- we’re not doing that much. Not taking out any walls, just putting in improved versions of what’s already there. It’s still going to be crazy and chaotic though.
Omg, this is going to be AMAZING when it’s all done. New cabinets and countertops will certainly give your kitchen a new pizzazz. And hooray for making better use of your kitchen layout – even a tiny one can be better configured to meet your needs. Excited to see what it will look like when it’s done!
ha, I’m excited too! Right now it’s a disaster zone. We also found a ton of mold behind the sink, so that will have to go. It always take longer than you think it’s going to!
We did a major kitchen redo 24 years ago when I was pregnant with my youngest! It’s hard to believe. We could use an update–the cabinets are cherry and they are still beautiful, but the backsplash and countertops need to be changed out. The hubs disagrees. Sigh….
Ha ha, my husband disagreed for a long time too! Now that we have the sink ripped out we can see a ton of mold back there. So it’s a good thing we’re doing this!
Oh, how exciting (NOT!) you have your own tile story! LOL I am excited about your new kitchen though… although it’s a big disruption, I am sure you’ll be so happy to have brand-new cabinets and counters! 🙂
Our kitchen looks like it’s from the 30’s… cheap, painted built-in wood cabinets. And the countertop light-blue tiles (with dark- green tile border) are the same tiles that we have on the floor in the bathroom. Lovely. Who the hell thought that was a good idea??
Ha ha, that’s FUNNY! Yes, I’m excited to get the kitchen done- although it’s taking a lot longer than we thought it would. But that’s the way it always is, right?
Oh, this took me back. My parents renovated their house (40 years this December, yikes) when we moved in. There were something like 7 layers of *wallpaper* in the dining room. One of which was grasscloth. And there was some hideous flooring in the kitchen. Also? The basement was all (ALL) bright sunshine yellow. Instantly induced a migraine, if one were prone to that. It also boasted a full bath (oh, yes)… without any walls. So it was a big basement room – into which the stairs descended – with… an open bathroom. Ummm…
So I am sure they would be sympathizing with you right now. It was an adventure. Fortunately, eating out will break you out of your broccoli/tofu/rice rut, right? 🙂
Ha ha, that’s true- my body has enjoyed a break from that meal.
That must have been quite a renovation. I can only imagine how hard it must have been to remove seven layers of wallpaper. And, the full bath in the bright yellow basement, completely open, makes me think there should be a “Florida Man” story attached to it!