Kitchen Update

It has been mentioned that I have been parsimonious with my updates on the kitchen. It's true. My excuse is I have less time than ever because everything takes about 3 times as long, seeing as we're sort of camping. Cooking, serving and cleaning up from cooking take forever. I'm trying to feed the family well so we don't all die of scurvy or something from living on fast food for the duration. We do have running water, though I have to carry it from across the house; we do have a working stove, but it's on the back porch. And the fridge is in another part of the house entirely. I don't have any right to complain, but I AM slow. Not to mention the fact that I sometimes must run around the outside of the house to get from the main part of the house to my back-porch kitchen when Les is working on a scaffold, or has the doorways blocked with plastic sheeting, or whatever. The kitchen of this house is right on the way to just about everywhere else in this house. It should be really interesting when we're finishing the floors and cannot walk on them for a few days. Maybe I'll just go to Paris. Yep, that would be the simplest thing: We go to Paris for a few weeks and come back and it'll all be done. Sure.

Anyway I have taken a few pictures but they are not too exciting. I'll add them later. The drywall is all up. Les is taping and mudding today. The ceiling is presently bare lath covered with a sheet of plastic as a moisture barrier. I spent part of yesterday painting all the beaded board for the ceiling RED. It's stacked in the garage, awaiting that part of the project. And the gorgeous hard maple flooring - 4-inch planks - was just dropped off and is currently stacked in the front room, bundled by length, smelling wonderful. It is so pretty! This is not the very top grade of wood; I didn't want it totally clear. Neither is it "character" or "rustic" grade. It's somewhere between those extremes, with some grain to it, and a few closed knotholes, and it has such life. It's pretty now, just rough sanded. When it is installed, sanded and treated with polyurethane, it will just glow. This is local maple, mind you - cut by Konkel Forest Products, kiln dried by the Amish, then sent back to Konkel's Hardwoods division, where Tony Konkel cut it into planks and then tongue-and-groove cut it. Our planks were a little more pricey than the standard 3-inch boards, but still it was $3.85 a square foot, for a floor that should last for the next 100 years or so of this house. In fact, it will probably outlast the house.

Let's see... What else? Oh. John Pitts came back to talk more about the cabinets, and we worked out a few more details. He's not ready to start yet, still has 2 projects before ours, but he promises me we'll be done by Thanksgiving. Good thing, too, because we just invited my parents and two college students to come to Thanksgiving. When he gets ready to actually start the cabinets, he will pick up our range hood, our IKEA Domsjo sink, and... something else, I can't remember what it is, and take all this stuff over to his shop and build the cabinets to suit all of them perfectly. Oh yeah, I remember -- not a thing that he has to take, but he'll take the leftover paint from the ceiling planks and use it to match for the cabinet fronts, that's it.

My jobs at present are:

1. Stay out of Les's way as much as possible.
2. Earn as much money as possible to pay for all this stuff.
3. Pick out some white paint and
4. some metal grid to put in the door panels below the sink.

The metal grid panels are not cooperating with my searching so far. What I'd really, really like would be fine half-inch chicken wire, maybe in stainless steel wire for strength. It can be obtained, it does exist, but it's EXPENSIVE. Still looking.

---

Hey, look what I found right after making that post!

I'll have to see what Barry thinks. He's Obstacle #1 for any of my design ideas. If he goes for it, then I have to try to convince John Pitts. Heh.

---

Another update. Barry said no, and for a good reason: Too much stuff will show through, and cabinets-under-the-sink are full of gross stuff. So I am back to no cabinet doors under the sink and little curtains. Which I love anyway.