The kitchen renovation is delayed… and through no fault of our contractor.

There’s part of me that wants to laugh, and part of me that’s just shaking my head.  So, early on we had problems with the cabinet colours.  The colour we wanted, in combination with the wood we wanted came out much darker than what we actually wanted so back to the drawing board on the cabinets.  We got through that.

Aparently, we ordered, and got, the last two pieces of Caesarstone 9140 Charcoal to be made in Canada.  It was PERFECT.  Until this week when, on the day our cabinets were going in, our contractor got a call.  Caesarstone smashed one of the two pieces we needed to make our counter top.  WTF?  Our contractors were more angry than we were.  Yes, we were pretty disappointed as it was *the* colour we wanted.

So after getting the templating done, we were told that we actually needed two pieces of the Caesarstone and we couldn’t do it with just one.  DOH!

So back to the drawing board.  We already had another Caesarstone picked – 6140 Smokey Ash.  But checking the other vendors that Stone Edge, our fabricator has access to – we also looked at Silestone and Hanstone which had quartz more similar to the Caesarstone 9140.

We ended up picking up Ebony Pearl from Silestone.

*shakes head*

Yup, we’re delayed, through no fault of our contractor’s.

Shadow inspecting the work after the painter left, and Gavin taking a nap.

A sign of good drywall and painting

This was probably the slowest week of the renovation as I said,  It’s all about drywall and painting – which are important and vital, and messy as all get.  Afterall, this is what people will see so it needs to be done right.

Firstly, it’s amazing how seamless a wall looks when it’s been drywalled correctly.  In the picture on the right, you would not know that the wall was extended to the right by about 2 inches – you can’t see it, and that the paint job is partially the old paint job from 6 years ago and one from today.  Seamless.

The paint colour for the living room is Behr Promenade Green – using Sherwin Williams paint, matched to a sample that was taken from the wall we tore down.  The kitchen is Sherwin Williams Bees Wax.

The kitchen is starting to take shape and as of Tuesday next week, we’ll have cabinets in!

Next week it’s

• Second coat of paint on the walls
• Cabinet installation
• Crown moulding installation
• Electrical and lighting installation (we hope)
• Counter top templating

Week after

• Counter top installation (we hope)
• Plumbing
• Completion

We are well on track with this project.  The only thing that would delay the project is the counter top or if the cabinets were wrong in some way.  It would be nice to have this all done by my birthday. 🙂

Our starting and end point

The second reno we started, and first to finish is done – the laundry room.

I still can’t believe we went from this awful peel and stick tile to real tile and real paint.

Yes, that awful… olive green colour that was common in the 1970s no longer exists in our laundry room.  It does, however, exist in our storage locker.  And that’s okay.  I don’t see a need to renovate that.

You can see how awful the space was with the new with the new washer and dryer – which still needed to be stacked.

Once stacked, we can put the freezer back in, put up some nice shelving and we’re back in business.

That won’t happen until Monday when our washer is replaced with, hopefully, a non defective unit.

So why do the laundry room?  Well, it needed to be done – we needed at a minimum, a tiled floor. The state of the peel and stick was just awful.  The walls needed a fresh paint job – I don’t think they had ever been painted since the unit was built.  In short, it needed some TLC.

In the cloud of laundry!

The colour choice?  Sherwin Williams Resonant Blue.  That’s a personal decision.  If one of these days we sell the condo and move, whoever moves in can paint the laundry room whatever colour they want and I think they’ll like the tile we put in.  That said, I want to be able to spend time enjoying the space as we have designed it.

We’re ecstatic about the job ATD Contracting Services did on the space, and the progress they’ve made on the kitchen.

Talking to our contractor this week, they commented on how well organized Scott and I were with where with setting up a rack to place all our food and dishes, having our coffee maker, microwave and toaster available;  having a place for everything that we all will need access to.  Even having food pre-made and frozen so that all we need to do is to microwave some veggies, and maybe make rice in the rice maker and we have a complete meal.

The one thing I have been surprised about this renovation is how dusty and how dry the condo has been.

Let me be clear – I knew it would get dusty, I’m just surprised at how quickly after the first day of demolition and just how far reaching.  There’s dust all the way into the bedroom, even keeping the doors closed.  Obviously covering things up goes a long way to keeping the dust off our stuff, unless, of course, your dining room and living room are acting like a makeshift kitchen.

Having a great vacuum helps.  Scott and I have been vacuuming the condo every day, where we can.  Mainly the floors but we also did a bit of a dusting of the entertainment unit and surfaces we could access.  I’m very glad for HEPA filters on vacuums these days.  Honestly – Dyson all the way.  I would not consider any other vacuum on the market today.

The other issue we’ve had is around the humidity level of the condo.  With all the dust and stuff flying through the air, the humidity level has dropped quite a bit.  Add opening the door to the balcony or opening windows and the humidity level dropped to about 21%.  There’s a fine balance to opening up and getting fresh air in the place, the vacuum and pressure that causes spreading dust around the condo and the humidity level.

We a run a small room humidifier to help things out, which also shows the humidity levels in the air.  Closing up the windows brought the humidity level up by 10 to 20 points alone.  To really boost the humidity level, Scott and I having our showers in the morning helped as well.  And that has helped up to be able to breathe better.

The bathroom renovation of 2012 really showed us the stamina required to get through a 2-3 week renovation.  Now for me, I have to admit I’m struggling a bit more because I was away for most of the bathroom renovation.  Hats off to Scott who lived that complete renovation and this renovation.

Next week is drywall, painting and electrical panel installation week:

• Dry walling – Bulk head, and a two-foot wide wall 
• Patching any holes and such in the kitchen and laundry room
• Painting of parts of the kitchen and the laundry room
• Hopefully getting our washer finally repaired and all setup
• Getting the electrical panel replaced

By the end of next week, we should be able to put the laundry room together and be done with that, freeing up a considerable amount of space in the living room.

Once our new electrical panel is in, we can then get rid of a whole bunch of stuff in the bedroom.  Mainly our boxes of Christmas decorations and the tree, that live in the storage room where the electrical panel resides.

I’m probably dreaming, but It would be really nice if the cabinets arrived a bit early so that things could be installed that much sooner.  April 15th can’t come soon enough, admittedly.  If all goes well, then the week of April 22nd will be final electrical, and counter top installation and backsplash by April 29th.