Maddie

We lost our 14yr old fur baby this past Monday night. This pic was take several years ago on a camping trip in Sevierville … she was standing guard over the campsite. She was a good dog.

Maddie (2005 - 2019)

OBX 2019

I forgot to post the lighthouse pics from our trip to Rodanthe back in July.

Bodie Island Lighthouse

the classic Roanoke Marshes Lighthouse angle

side view

the classic Cape Hatteras Lighthouse angle

Ocracoke Island Light Station

Currituck Beach Lighthouse in Corolla

Kitchen Remodel

Since the day we bought this house we've been complaining about the kitchen layout and planning on doing a tear-down and rebuild. For the last 20 years we've tried several arrangements with different pieces to make it as useful as possible, but we always knew it was a losing cause.

So last December we decided to pull the handle on the kitchen remodel. We've been talking about what we'd like to do to it for years so we had a good idea what we wanted it to look like when we are done.

Before we bought the house it was originally designed with an L-shaped kitchen - along the left and back walls in the picture below - with an island containing the sink and the dishwasher. But it was changed to a galley-style by sliding the island to the left and adding a cabinet beside the sink and the pony wall. We were never fans of the pony wall; the saving grace was that it did add a place to install upper cabinets, so that was ok.

The last time it will look like this. We will setup a temporary kitchen in the dining room.

The first thing to go were the cabinets over the kitchen sink. We temporarily installed them in the garage as storage for all the stuff in the kitchen until the remodel is done. I'll probably leave some of them afterward because they make good places to stash stuff, and they're free.

They gone. 

Next to go was the movable island. Next was to cover the hardwood floor until after the popcorn ceiling is removed, the sheetrock work is done, and the painting is done.

Next to go were the upper cabinets over the stove. Each time we remove something it makes the wallpaper look that much worse.

And the fridge surround.

Even though the entire ceiling in the house is popcorn'd, we only removed the popcorn ceiling over the kitchen area. The popcorn came down remarkably easy. I bought a tool that used plastic grocery bags to catch the popcorn as it was scraped off. It was quick and relatively mess free. Then came the scraping and repairing the sheetrock ceiling; it had never been finished because it was always going to be popcorn'd. I patched and sanded many times until we got it smooth enough. In retrospect, I would have been better off to have re-taped all the seams and skim-coated the entire ceiling rather than just fix spots; it would have been faster and results would have been better.

Popcorn ceiling is gone and the sheetrock on the ceiling is patched and sanded.

The next several days will be spent removing the wallpaper and repairing the damage done because the wallpaper was applied directly to the sheetrock without sizing. We started with chemicals but no joy. We then bought a steamer and found that worked pretty well. It made a wet, sloppy mess, but it worked.

After lots of steaming and scrapping the wallpaper is finally gone!

The stove and lower cabinets are gone so that I can begin moving the electrical to the new cabinet positions. The refrigerator is staying in the same place so I don't have to move the ice-maker water connection - more on the issue this caused up later. The range is moving just far enough down the wall that we can get away with not moving the gas line.

Need to move the outlets down the wall to make room for the pantry.

Outlets are moved and drywall patches in place.

Drywall mudded and finished

With the back wall electrical completed, we can now work on the pony wall and remaining cabinets. This is where our vision for the new kitchen layout finally starts to take shape.

The sink and dishwasher and remaining base cabinets removed.

At this point we decided to put a coat of primer on everything and get the new lighting installed.

The original plan called for 6 cans in the kitchen itself and two additional cans under the soffit over the window, but it became impossible to run wiring inside the soffit so we scrapped that idea nd just repositioned the 6 cans to cover the whole are. It worked out well.

The pony wall is now a knee wall. Finally we can finally start to see what we envisioned.

At this point the cabinets got delayed by 11 days. This is where then plan for the wall went off track too. The pony wall was attached to the wall on the left about 3 inches in from the edge - we're not sure why - so we decided to take the wall down and reposition it the 3 inches so that the corners would line up. This had some unforeseen consequences that I'll mention later.

The Pony wall is gone! Next up is replacing the busted sheetrock where the walls met.

At this point the appliances got delayed by 10 days. So the time was spent rebuilding the knee wall and running the electrical. I also had to patch up the plumbing for the kitchen sink and dishwasher.

New pony wall framed and electric done.

The girls picked the color scheme and painted the walls.

Because we are going to use granite for the countertops the wall needs to have notches cut for the granite brackets. Tedious and noisy and it has to be done just right.

I ship-lapped! Chip -n- JoJo would be proud. GraniteBrackets installed too.

Plumbing rough-in is done!

The cabinets are here! Only 11 days late …

The appliances got here the following day, no bumps or scrapes, so nothing to return! Cabinet installation scheduled for 9 days later. Measuring for the Granite is scheduled for the following Monday and installation the Monday after that. 

While waiting for the cabinet guys I installed the pendant lights over the bar.

The cabinet guys came by to unpack and stage the cabinets for installation … it's happening!

Cabinets are only mostly installed, the two uppers were the wrong size … dangit.

This was when the wheels started coming off on this remodel ... and we were doing so good up till now.

It started with the wrong pantry being ordered, was supposed to be 96" high, but a 93" unit got ordered and installed. That meant the upper cabinets would only be 15" over the countertops instead of the required 18" … so we needed to get new (shorter) upper cabinets, which took another 5 weeks. This also meant the upper cabinets would not be installed at 96" but at 93" so there's now a gap above the uppers that will have to be accounted for.

Next up was the microwave cabinet. The drawer wouldn't clear the trim around the pass-thru. The solution was to order a drawer-front that was narrower on the side against the wall. We then found out the cabinet would not work with the microwave and trim kit that we bought. So we ended up buying a really spendy drawer-style microwave. But now that one has a problem too; it would not clear the trim around the pass-thru. The cabinets had to get shuffled down the wall and a spacer and new toe-kick ordered to fill up the gap. But there still wasn't enough room so I ended up shaving the trim around the door to finally allow enough clearance for the drawer.

After shuffling the cabinets down the wall and working the trim around the pass-thru … the dishwasher and microwave are finally installed.

After delaying the granite measuring for a week to get the cabinet placement problems worked out, we finally got the granite measuring done and installation scheduled.

The granite is installed! We had to buy a new faucet 'cause the handle on the old one hit the bar top.

It was a cold weekend so I spent some time in the attic installing the exhaust piping for the range hood. It was a good thing I test-fit the range hood before the tile backsplash was installed. I found out that I had to move the outlet up to clear the body of the hood. This would have been a real mess if the tile was already installed.

Range hood mounting hardware installed and piping done.

At this point we get notified that the final two upper cabinets have arrived and the installer is scheduled … it might actually get finished.

Drawer pullse on the existing cabinets is installed. Shiplap around the window is painted and most of the trim work is finished and paint touchups are done!

Roman shade is installed over the window and the coffee station is up and running. A keen eye will notice the old grill cover on the deck is gone.

 

The remaining two cabinets are finally installed. The remaining trim work is complete as well.

At this point we installed the refrigerator and discovered the final goober caused by the cabinet placement. Remember back when I mentioned not wanting to move the ice-maker water connection to reduce the amount of plumbing, well that decision came back to haunt us. Leaving the refrigerator in the corner - instead of putting the pantry in the corner -  prevents the left door on the refrigerator from opening all the way. This is going to require that we remove a section of wall to widen the pass-thru far enough back to allow the refrigerator door to fully open. We've decided to leave that work until later.

The tile installer is scheduled and the tile is bought. Simple white subway tile with white grout. There's so much color on all the other surfaces that we decided to go for a clean, bright, white backsplash.

Two weeks later and the tile is done! It looks awesome.

The range hood install was a bit tedious but it's done too. The range is installed and no gas leaks!

All that remains at this point is a few pieces of trim work that require that I buy yet another tool - a pneumatic pin nailer. Once that's here I'll install the trim along the cabinet edges and along the sides of the range hood's chimney. Install a couple of shelves then we'll be done! Finally! Yeah!