Once upon a time there was a kitchen project

From a late night delivery

to a slow start

to a brand new amazing kitchen... 

 WE DID IT!!!!!!!!!

ps... remember that one time when we bought a house with a kitchen that used to look like this?

Shelf time

Before we hung the drywall we meticulously placed some studs in the exact locations to mount our kitchen self brackets.  About a month ago, as we got ready to hang the brackets... we realized we had no idea where the studs were, or where the random scrap of paper with the measurements disappeared to. This proved a tad frustrating as the new stud finder ended up being useless.  All in all, many holes were drilled, later filled, and our beautiful shelves finally hung!  Thank you Salvage Works for being such a great neighborhood store and resource!

Kitchen Counters

We've been wondering about our kitchen counters for quite a while now.  Should we buy cement counters? Should we make cement counters? Should we get marble tiles?  Should we go with granite?  Should we find some reclaimed lumber to make a butcher block counter? With some plywood "counters" temporarily in place and treating us just fine we thought we'd be set for a while.  Then, bam! Ryan suddenly goes out, picks up a few things at Ikea and within a couple of days... surprise, finished counters! 

Chocolate cake

Baking a valentines cake is the best.  We managed to eat half in about a day.  Thank you new oven.

Sink/Dishwasher/Garbage disposal

For about a week now we've been collecting all of our dirty dishes in hopes of finally loading up the dishwasher and turning her on... last night, success!  We bought some dishwasher soap and made it happen.  This was big folks, we have NEVER had a dishwasher before and feel very grown up.  
We couldn't have done it without Mike's help a few weeks ago!  Thanks for such a great Schoonover family visit ya'll! 

"He'll be cooking for you tonight my dear!"

- Tim, the gas piping guy informing me that he finished the job. 

Last friday, I came home from work to find a truly exciting kitchen milestone completed.  With a newly connected gas line from our basement furnace to the kitchen, we now have a working gas stove and oven!!!!  Yay! 
Check out the power on that oven broiler... just imagine the browning potential.  Next step, remember how to make delicious items from scratch that involve baking and simmering. 

Superbowl Interlude

Yes, it's true...Ryan made a giant 49er bobble head and we threw a little super bowl party.  
GO NINERS!!!!

Cabinet update!

Well... we've done it.  We conquered the Ikea cabinet invasion and are currently loving our new kitchen drawers and cupboards.   They close without slamming, glide like a charm, and look so clean!  Our kitchen is starting to feel like a real life spacious kitchen at last.   Here, you can also see the final kitchen vent relocation in the toe kick under the cabinets... you'd never know there used to be a nasty hole in the floor smack in the middle of that section.  whew. 

Kitchen vent relocation

When we began piecing together the kitchen cabinets we realized that the heating vent was positioned incorrectly.  This ment that the grate would stick out infront of the base of the cabinets.  Ryan spent a day fixing this dilema, maverick style.  First he ripped out the duct work and vent, cutting away a 1 ft. section of our newly refinished floor. (AHH!!!) Next, he cut a new duct hole in the floor a few inches further underneath where the cabinet would sit.  He then ripped up a few more of the newly refinished floor boards from underneath another set of base cabinets.  After patching the hole in the floor and refitting some new duct work in the basement, he fit the "new" floor board piece into the space he created when initially ripping out the vent.  After sanding the new connection joints in the floor, we're ready for a little coat of polyurethane and some more cabinet work.

Ikea cabinet invasion

When our kitchen cabinet delivery of literally 91 different items arrived the other night at 10pm.... we weren't overwhelmed at all.... just kidding.
After we got over the initial shock we started ripping open boxes, decoding Swedish directions, and pulling our hair out.  Imagine a giant 3d puzzle that takes an obscenely long time with an endless number of screw varieties and random parts.