2. a blog formatted on the basis of topics, rather than a chronological story line, in the attempt to create a slimmer, leaner, less verbose blog [for the sake of the readers/the sanity of the author]
just to hopefully keep me on track, and possibly to keep you guys interested, im going to go ahead and list out the topics that i hope to cover in this blog, and if not, then one or two or however many it takes thereafter... [lets hope i can do it in one, i really dont like being so far behind]
christmas
moving
kitchen
new years
craigslist
electrical
roof
and with that, lets begin shall we?
christmas.
well last i blogged, i believe i summed up christmas pretty well. we'd just finished christmas day and a wonderful feast and we were quite happy as we retired for the night. already the house felt like home and i dont think we ever had trouble adjusting to the new sleeping situation.
the day following christmas, we made a terrible mistake. we'd gotten a number of gift cards from various friends and relatives and we were excited to spend them, not to mention i'd heard through an inside source of mine that target was going to be having a pretty sweet christmas sale on all their leftover merchandise and the wife and i were excited about stocking up on goodies for next year that we didnt get this time around.
so like complete morons, we headed out to do some shopping on the day after christmas. [oh how naive we were...] so our first stop was target and it should have been an eye opening experience if we'd cared to pay attention. we spent about an hour to an hour and a half there leaving somewhere around 10:30 with a basket piled high of christmas decorating goodies we'd gotten for a very reasonable price. but it had been a total mad house in there. there were so many people picking through the leftovers it was nearly impossibly to maneuver a cart through the droves of post-holiday sale victims [ourselves included]. so this should have been our warning, and we should have gone home for a nice relaxing afternoon. but we didnt.
we spent the rest of the day in traffic and going to forever 21, dillards, and american eagle at the mall and picking up a few items [mostly clothes, but a few accessories] with our gift cards. waiting in parking lots and sitting in mile long lines at stop lights did nothing to hinder our spirits however, and the gluttons for punishment that we are we also went to bed bath & beyond to finally use our wedding gift cards on some much needed drapery and window treatments, and then finally even to tj max for some serious husband torture while the wife took her time going through [and im pretty sure this is accurate] every single rack, garment by garment, and eventually leaving an hour and a half later with... nothing. thats right, nothing. ugh, that was a long shopping visit after we'd already spent the entire day shopping at it was somewhere around 7pm. i honestly cant even remember if we ate lunch in all the madness! lol! if i had the chance to do it all over again, id probably keep my ass on the couch with a movie and some hot chocolate, but we had fun and we did get quite a lot accomplished! =]
moving.
saturday we made a pact to ourselves that we were going to get out of that apartment that weekend if it killed us, and thats exactly what we did. we got up early, made our way to the apartment with a load of empty boxes and some cleaning supplies and went through the exhausting task of packing up every single last item in the apartment, loading - what ended up being 4 or 5 trips worth of boxes, the rest of the furniture, and other various items from the apartment - hauling to the house, unloading, and returning to the scene of the crime for more punishment. by the end of the night however, around 9pm, we'd done it. we were completely out of the apartment and only needed to take our keys and drop them off with the manager on sunday afternoon.
actually, it wasnt all terrible, we managed to take a break at about lunch time to grab a quick bite and make a quick run to the salvation army where we found a couple more awesome hanging light fixtures that we were still in need of, a few more corner cabinets for a functional art project of karens, and [believe it or not] a few suit jackets for me, lol! you wouldnt believe the awesome selection our salvation army has on clothes. it was absolutely amazing! karen actually found what appeared to be a practically brand new express jacket in the womens suit jackets that she swears would have cost around $250 new, and was only 4 bucks! it was awesome. in the mens they had all kinds of name brands that id heard of, but regardless of labels they had just about every shape style and color you could imagine, ranging from the hilarious, to the very cool vintage, to the boring, you name it. we actually had a really good time there and by the time we left we'd only spent 35 bucks for a LOT of great finds! if you have a salvation army resale store near you and youre into this kind of stuff, i seriously recommend checking it out, we are always shocked at the fantastic stuff we find there.
kitchen.
sometime early the next week [i think it may even have been monday] after a lot of discussion, karen and i had decided that we needed to make the kitchen our next project. most of the necessity arose from finally getting all of our stuff into the house [and it was a disaster by the way] and realizing that we had way more stuff than we had storage space in our kitchen. somewhere between everything karen had, everything i had, and everything we got for wedding gifts, we'd assembled about 2 kitchens worth of kitchen stuff and we only had this tiny little corner of cabinets in the kitchen to put it all in.... you do the math on that one. not to mention we had always thought the cabinets looked like they were in pretty good shape and would be perfectly fine to use for some time yet. well once we put on the new door hardware and started trying to clean these things we realized just how disgusting they really were, and as soon as we started putting stuff in them we realized how weak and poorly structured they were... so as a combination of all these things karen and i discussed at length what our options might be and ultimately decided we needed all new cabinets and a lot more of them pretty seriously.
i dont know how much research any of you have done into new cabinets, but we quickly found out that its a pretty expensive ordeal. that monday night we went first to a place in town called home emporium - and it is an awesome place! its kind of a salvage store of sorts and they sell a lot of bulk material and unfinished furniture, wholesale tile, man... it was remodeling paradise. we took our time going through the place and browsing all the different things in the store [and making mental notes for future projects of course!] but were mainly focused on the cabinets. our contractor [i suppose we'll get to him at some point] had told us this place had finished and unfinished kitchen cabinets for a really reasonable price, hence why we'd stopped by. however after we started looking at their selection, none of which was really our style.. it was all very ornate or more traditional looking, and seeing the price tags on everything [which we quickly did the math in our heads on what we were thinking about putting in] and seeing how limited we were in sizes and customization... we decided that these cabinets werent for us. [however, we're definitely going back for tile when we get around to those projects!!] which left our only other real option - ikea.
i know theres a lot of opinions on both sides as to the quality, value, etc. of ikea furniture, but id always been impressed with their kitchens when id walked through their showroom. to me, they never looked cheap or ratty, and always seemed to have a more modern sleek style that was more in line with my own. so even though it was now around 6:30pm, karen and i decided to detour on our way home and check out what our options would be if we were to seriously consider ikea. well i really had no idea how many options there really were, but the entire process is a bit confusing at first. basically the way their kitchen cabinets are setup is in 3 parts. first there is the skeleton of the cabinets. all of their cabinets use the same skeleton of parts that come in a very wide range of sizes, shapes, depths, heights, you name it. the customization factor is no issue hear, you can really get almost anything you want and create whatever combination you desire. the second layer of their cabinets is in the shell. this is essentially the style of doors and panels that you like. so if you like the ultramodern with ultramodern finishes, or the more traditional style doors with more traditional finishes, if you want glass in some of your doors, if you want metal edges, if you want wood, plastic, the list goes on and on and on. so once you pick the shell, then theres the accents. this is all your hardware, your organizational inserts, that sort of thing. well anyway, it took us quite some time to go through the kitchen showroom and pick out the styles we liked, compare prices, figure out the whole 3 part system and how that worked, and come up with what we thought would work for us. by the end of the night we had a lot of fun ideas in our minds and a pretty good idea of what style we were thinking about getting, but we certainly werent jumping into anything just yet.
since that initial day weve measured the kitchen out completely and ive modeled it in 3d and we've gone over a number of different arrangement options, color schemes, organization systems, etc. but the most determining factor of the whole extravaganza is really the price tag. and at this point we really just cant afford it - even if we do feel its a necessity. so we've also started thinking of some other more... creative or inventive, ways of dealing with our storage problem. well after some ingenuity and a little thinking outside the box we came up with a pretty slick solution that were really excited about. additionally the kitchen just needed a world of help and painting could do wonders for it aesthetically.
at this point [some weeks later] we've completed the design, crafting, and installation of about two-thirds of our new storage system and weve gotten one wall fully painted with two coats, and two other walls painted [literally as i type this its drying] with the first coat. all this after a ton of scrubbing [like you wouldnt believe!], cleaning, plastering, taping, and prepping. but im happy to report its really coming along! we're extremely happy with the storage system so far and the color is just amazing! we love it! as with everything we've hit a few snags along the way so far. the track lighting in the kitchen for example, but we've powered through so far and we're really expecting a great turnout in the end! we've decided we're going to have to make due with the cabinets we do have for the time being, but we really would love to get the ikea kitchen someday in the future, its just hard to say when that might be. anyway, without further prolonging, how about a few before and progress shots of the kitchen hmm? haha, i know you want them! [try and keep in mind that the pictures really dont do the color justice, its really sensational in person!]
yeah, thats right, its peg board! haha, dont hate. it works perfectly on that wall because its too tight to ever put cabinets on, but also allows us to incorporate storage and we still have the space to work on the other walls we are thinking of putting cabinets or shelves on. its really a fantastic solution for our circumstances and we just love it! [i wouldnt recommend our set-up for a novice installation however, mostly considering the pain-staking assembly considerations and preparation, lol! it was a bit of a pain in the ass... to say the least.]
and thats where i think im going to stop. thats my lovely wife preparing dinner in the images and she just finished, so i think im going to indulge in a little of karens chicken chili!
goodnight!
3 comments:
Fabulous color on the walls!, but being spatially challenged, I can't figure out which wall the pegboard ended up on, the one by the back door and windows? or the one that leads to the washer/dryer room or? Do you think painting the cabinets would help them, in the photos they look fine, a deep clean with TSP and they should be ready to refinish or paint. The stove appears to be free floating in the room? Looking forward to seeing it all in person.
alright maybe i can help. the pegboard is on the wall with the pantry door that leads to the utility room. right now all of the kitchen appliances and furniture are crammed in as tight as possible to the center of the kitchen so that we can work on the walls around them without having to drape and tape everything with plastic. it seems to be working pretty well so far, we just have the floor and ceilings taped and covered.
anyway, the cabinets look okay i suppose, they arent really our style but after some refinishing and some paint the door could be fine. the real problem is the guts of the existing cabinets. weve cleaned all but one of them out and put in fresh contact paper and theyre functioning for the time being. but half the shelf supports are missing and theyre old cabinets so we havent been able to find shelf supports that fit yet [trust me weve looked] and even if we did find all new shelf supports, some of the shelves are sagging/cracking/or rotting - it appears the previous owner let them get liquid damage somehow and i fear they arent structurally sound.
i suppose we could cut new replacement shelves and use screw mount supports - it just seems like a lot of money to do so and we'd still have cabinets we didnt really like when it was over. not to mention the counter tops just have to go. theyre bad. you probably cant tell from the pictures but everything is particle board counter top covered in a burnt orange laminate and the one behind the sink is about to collapse in on itself any day. we definitely need to replace the counter tops at some point no matter what we end up doing.
anyway, im glad you like the color. the pictures really dont do the color or the pegboard any kind of justice, but theyre just progress pictures and once we can move the furniture back to its rightful place, the room should open up a lot more and we should be able to get some much better shots. either way, hopefully itll be in much better shape by the time you get to see it. we're really excited for your visit, cant wait! =]
oh, and mom, just for you... check out the updated site. ;]
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