Tips for prepping for/surviving kitchen reno?
Sally T
7 months ago
last modified: 7 months ago
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palimpsest
7 months agolast modified: 7 months agoRelated Discussions
Tips on surviving a gut remodel?
Comments (33)robotropolis: well said. And funny as heck. I am trying to skip over the "i need a vacation" and move straight on to acceptance. It doesn't help that my family doesn't quite want to follow my guidance on how to live in our modified house. A tantrum might be in order. I'm flying to NOLA for the weekend on Friday. I've encouraged the contractors to take the day off. We've already had to bail for the in-laws' and kennel the pets once, while the furnace was out. I, too, am home all day, and I rather love watching them work (which means I'm getting less work done myself), but I've managed to stick my nose in a few times to prevent mistakes. The weather in Chicagoland is causing delays. Our GC is my husband's cousin, which is brilliant in a lot of ways, but also a slight tightrope act in that I love my husband's family more than my own and don't want any bad feelings are a result. They also live in the far west suburbs, which means it's a hike for them to get here. A hike that is far worse when there's snow. We've had other contractors mess up bits and pieces of our house, and it's nothing short of wonderful to see the thoughtful, careful, meticulous work these guys are doing for us. They are even't close to the cheapest, but the other contractors weren't exactly cheap either, and we couldn't get through to them that, yes, we really want to spend 2/3 the value of the house on fixing it up. So please do a proper job and send us a bill. I'm also glad to know I'm not the only "Boss Lady," sherri58. That was another problem with other contractors that I no longer have. They would always look to my husband for guidance, and this is just not his domain. He put this all in my capable hands and everyone from the architect to the plumber has been made aware that I'm in charge. As it turns out, I've got some light construction experience under my belt (I can even weld). No one is going to "little lady" me. :-)...See MoreRemodel recipes? Surviving wo a kitchen
Comments (19)George Foreman Lean Mean Fat Grilling Machine! (so easy to clean, and can make all sorts of things on it: quesidillas, frozen salmon/turkey patties, grilled cheese panninis -- Trader Joes is great place to shop for these not quite camping but almost foods) Microwave Toaster Oven Frig in Living room Temporary sink (a cheap utility sink is what I used. My folks set up a temp kitchen in their bathroom. Mom washed dishes on a gardening kneeler thing in the tub for a couple of *months*!) Eat lots of salad, raw veggies, mellon, berries, apples fresh fresh bread/ Yummy cheese/ high quality nut butters. Sliced meats. Cold cereal. Variety of nuts. Crackers hummus olives olive oils for dipping ice cream yogurt bagels & cream cheese smoked salmon avocadoes bake muffins in tins in toaster oven bake mini quiches / omlettes in toaster oven (use either disposable or silicone cups. The silicone ones are super easy to clean.) Poached egg in silicone poaching cups. Blender for breakfast/desert smoothies? Chocolate chips for quick sweet tooth satisfaction :) Cold beer. All depends on how long you expect to be without kitchen! Each person in the family gets one set of utensils/cup/plate/coffee mug. Avoid roasting anything. Real pain to clean baking dishes of any kind. Electric tea kettle and press pot for coffee/tea. The auto shut off ones are great for hard boiled eggs! Really, if you look at it as a time to eat lots of delicious, in-season fresh foods (Mediterranean-style!), you'll likely introduce yourselves to new food options. I've not done it, but maybe you could get some good ideas from raw-food recipe books. HAVE FUN CAMPING AT HOME!...See MoreCalling all Kitchen Reno Survivors!
Comments (27)I'm in the early stages of a full gut job, so I only have a few things to say. My GC is really good about telling me what he needs and when, but I did run into a little time crunch with the flooring because it needs to sit for at least a week to acclimate and I couldn't make up my mind. He is great about answering my questions and helping me decide things if I'm confused - like we just went over light switches and there was a discussion on whether the under cabinet lighting should be on one switch or two. I would say the GC should definitely help with how much floor to order. I didn't have a KD, so I'm doing that. For me that's the biggest stressor - making all the decisions and stressing about them. So from that perspective, I would say get your stuff picked out and/or ordered early so you don't add to your stress about choosing and getting it on time. Also, that way you won't find that a light you like takes 2 months to be delivered. It's funny because I read here about other people saying something similar and I thought - eh, I won't pick something that will take that long to deliver, I'm not that fussy, I don't have that big of a budget, etc. And then I found that there is no rhyme or reason to how long things take to get. I picked a $50 light that had a fairly common look, but it was a little cheaper than the others, and the delivery estimate was 2 months, so I had to get one of the $70 ones that looked similar. Not a huge deal, but just an example. I don't know how much we are over budget right now. Originally I was hoping for a $30k remodel, but I had to expand that to $50k, and I think we may go over that by a little. Things like extra outlets and switches are going to add up. He did a great job putting up plastic to keep the dust out. Unfortunately it made it so we pretty much could only use half of our house - kitchen, dining room and downstairs bathroom is behind the plastic. The main problem we have there is that we have a dog and his dog door was in the kitchen, but we are dealing. We have baby gate up on the one side and we just have to walk him more. Our dining room is the 'staging area' where we have our new fridge (which we are using), and all the other stuff that I have bought and they haven't put in yet - other appliances, sink, faucet, flooring, etc. We have a little temporary kitchen set up in the office. I have a pretty small house, so it is tight, and it wasn't possible to put the fridge in there with everything else. We are using a toaster oven, crock pot, microwave and sous vide. We are only finishing up week 2, but so far it hasn't been too bad. I make one big meal in the crock pot - stew, casserole type one pot meal - and eat that every day for lunch and two dinners. Then we make something else one night - last week it was london broil in the sous vide, this week it's meatloaf in the toaster oven. Then we go to family every Friday anyway. We go out once or twice and so far have gone to friends or family another day. Ok I guess I had a lot to say after all.. Here are some pictures just for fun. because I'm dying to share with someone but didn't have a good reason to start a thread about it. Before: kitchen - yes it's horrible, just horrible. I see some of these before pictures and I think, man wait until you see mine! We painted the cabinets red when we moved in because they were a really dark stained wood and the stain wasn't even in the best condition. I thought the red would be fun and funky since we were planning to renovate anyway.... then it waited 10 years. I was going for a french bistro kinda look. dining room looking into kitchen now: kitchen - they found that the electric was so bad they decided to take down all the plaster, then they found that there were no studs or insulation, so they are adding that. (one of the things that is going to push us over the revised budget) As of this afternoon or tomorrow there will be no back wall there because we are taking out that window and door and putting in french doors. - that's one of the things that made the original budget get revised. in the dining room looking into the kitchen - taking that load bearing wall with all it's duct work and electric is another thing that made the original estimate go up. (the board in the middle hanging down there is literally just holding the light switch.) Oh also, I think the work phase of ours is going to be about 6 weeks. I've been planning for 3 months. My GC is on site almost every day. I let the guys use our downstairs half bath. We have just pretty much not been using it. The floor is dirty, but other than that they seem to be being pretty good about respecting our stuff, but it's really only my GC and one other guy, and my GC is I would say pretty invested in making me happy. I swear he must get half of his business from my mother-in-law. He's always like, 'oh I saw your mother-in-law last week when I was working on so and so's house' and my husband's uncle called us to ask the GC to give his spare key back. So our relationship is different than just any GC. He also worked the rough supplies into the estimate. I was responsible for picking out appliances, counters, cabinets, tile, etc. In the end he got the cabinets for me because he got a better price wholesale, so he WOULD do that stuff, but I like to comparison shop....See MoreKitchen reno, layout opinions please
Comments (13)Since nothing is going on the 103" wall, if you can extend the island by 9", I think Sammy's idea would work. Move the sink and DW to the peninsula, and put the range to the left of the window. I drew a hood 6" wider than the cooktop, to help contain the steam and grease plume. Alternately, you could center the range between the window and wall, and use a narrow upper on each side. You wouldn't have much landing space to the left, and the range would be very close to the entry--farther from the entry is safer, to give someone entering the space to swing away from the cook. Normally I'd want the trash pull-out below the prep space, but putting it beside the fridge would give you space for wide drawers to the right of the range. Again, dish storage will be in the prep space, but there is room for the pe3rson prepping to move over to the left, to allow loading and unloading of the DW. A trash pull-out under the sink would also work. The peninsula cabinet against the wall would open under the seating overhang--27" width would allow for the sink cab to be 3" from the perpendicular drawers, and filler on the other side of the corner would allow hardware to bypass on each cabinet. An advantage to the longer peninsula would be more space for each seat, so the little corner upper could be a full cabinet without being in someone's face. 36" for the traffic aisle is sufficient, since there is no cabinet or appliance opening into the aisle. Keep in mind that a DW on the end of a run will need a return panel, and the final length of the peninsula will depend on the width of the sink cabinet. I used 33". In either version, the peninsula can be moved a few inches toward the left (as drawn), to provide more space for the table and chairs. Thank you for asking but I am not a pro. :)...See MoreRTHawk
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