Kitchen Renovation 2008 - Part 3

Thursday, Feb 7 2008
We are looking after Jake for a week. He and Lady don’t seem to mind the mess. I’m the one who minds the most. Last weekend was ok – Anna had some friends round for a tea party and we could manage. But it’s getting progressively worse. I don’t think I’d invite anyone over now. It is driving me crazy and I have to keep envisioning the final finished kitchen, complete with beautiful firestone sink to maintain my sanity.

One unexpected positive spin – since I can’t cook, and we have to resort to either take out, or prepared food, I’ve noticed that I have more free time. No longer do I rush home and have to start the cooking prep – I have time to drink tea and read with the kids while the frozen lasagna cooks. Hence, I suppose, the popularity of prepared foods. I’ve just never thought about it before. On the down side, the “gourmet” chicken pot pie we had was decidedly inferior to the one I make.

Thursday, Feb 14, 2008
The kitchen comes along. It is now almost completely de-structed, which means we’re just about ready to re-construct. Thank goodness for Andrew. The big difference between him and me is that I went to Toastmasters last night and grumbled to everyone there about my lack of kitchen. What does Andrew do? He shows up and gives a hilarious speech about the kitchen, complete with props (a beer, a saw-z-all) and “scientific” numbers (the Nielsen factor of 2.733, by which you multiply your worst case estimate of time & money to see what it’s really going to cost). I might have elicited a few sympathetic glances; Andrew had everyone in an uproar – even me, which surprised me as I thought we accidentally threw out my sense of humour along with the kitchen sink.

He’s right about the Nielsen factor. The guy who quoted on the floor originally said if we allowed $10/square foot that would be plenty, but his estimate came in at almost double that. So we’re going to do the tiling ourselves. How hard can it be??

We also had the fireplace guy in to tell us what a fitted insert would cost, and that is going on the list of things to do – although maybe not until later in the year. No rush now, after all (though it is still bitterly cold winter outside).

You can spend hours debating the simplest things. Like the position of pot lights. Andrew has been doing all the wiring before the ceiling goes in. We debated the pot lights for ages, before the eureka moment: That I have no idea where the best position for pot lights is, so we should stop discussing this mute point and just put the darn lights somewhere.