We’ve Got A Kitchen Floor!

Lots of exclamation points in the post titles lately, and it’s all because big things are happening with the kitchen!!

So yesterday our floors went in. I kid you not from the time I left for work (he hadn’t arrived yet) to 1 o’clock it was already installed and filled. Blows my mind how people can work so fast. Perfectly installed hardwood floors in less that 5 hours!? For any of you locals looking for a flooring installer/refinisher Allen of Path Hardwood Floors is the guy to hire. Two years ago when we purchased our home, we sanded down our floors ourselves and hired Allen to finish the stain and finishing. He did such a spectacular job, my mother (who flips homes) has used him several times, and my brother used him for his studio floors as well. He’s basically made his way through our family. And he’s local in Ambler (in case you were wondering)

Teak makes the “before” pictures look so much better. #loveherface

And now to the install!…

Allen was able to get the same 3/4″ oak hardwood floor so that we wouldn’t have to have a seam between the kitchen and the dining room which made me the happiest interior designer homeowner ever. You’ll notice the stripes in the photos above – that’s actually wood filler. Seeing as Allen matched the floor he actually had to nail in each piece from the top rather than the more traditional groove and nail from the side versions that are sold today.

And by the time I got home from work he had it stained! Talk about finally seeing it all come together! Granted he’s coming back for more layers of stain and to put a few layers of poly on it, but you get the idea…

And the transition again:

Again, they’re not done yet, but won’t they look so rich when they are!? I’m beyond excited! Plus taking the dogs out the front door to go around to the back in order to avoid walking through the kitchen (as we have to leave the floor untouched) is getting old….especially since Teak takes the walk down the side of the house as a chance to pummel Cedar (and myself). The countdown is on though! We’ve officially decided to have a kitchen reveal party on the 4th of July! Fingers crossed I get all my final touch decor/cleaning/painting done by then!

For anyone interested: for this (roughly 10×10) space we’re paying $900 to have the new wood installed, stained and finished. Around $9 a square foot for matching flooring aint bad in my book. Especially considering that the 3/4″ wood is more expensive, has to be nailed in, filled, sanded, stained numerous times to match and finally a few coats of poly to finish it off.  I estimated about $1,000 when we were budgeting this project so we’re right on target.

 

pssst….once the project is all said and done I’ll do a great big break down of how much this kitchen cost us.

 

Drumroll Please….DRYWALL!

In trying to play blog catch up (just about there!) I’m posting our drywall images today as our floor is finally going in! Yay! Anyway, not a huge write up, pictures pretty much say all there is to say. But let me tell you, the moment drywall went up, it officially felt like progress. 🙂

 

 

Packing two posts into one here, also going to share mud photos as well:

 

I don’t know if you remember, but when the guys did the electrical – I mentioned that we first put it on the sides of the brick wall in this post HERE. I also mentioned that the inspector (though he passed our rough in) told us we had to change it and the outlets had to be on the brick wall. I initially thought we would do something like:

 

 

 

but I never really shared my inspiration with Ryan until we got the inspectaion. Ryan instantly was on board once he saw the photo and quickly added two outlets to our brick wall (you may be able to see them in the photos above, but if not, here’s a reallllly blurry rendition for ya! (sorry)

 

 

I really love the industrial feel of the electrical and think it will be balanced out with the brick wall and stainless steel appliances.

Our weekend was packed full, and we had such a wonderful time at my brothers gradation fiesta! Didn’t take any pics (boo me!) so I have to wait and see what family members took – hopefully I can share some pics of our fiesta decor! Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend…though, the weather was so absolutely perfect – how could you not?!

 

My First Time With Craigslist

You may have noticed that our old kitchen appliances are clearly no longer in the kitchen, the first weekend of demo, the guys removed them and put them on the front porch, where sadly they sat for over a week till I figured out a removal solution. I apologize I never got a photo of them on the front porch, but I had no desire to document my finest white trash moment.

The Fridge.
I found that PECO would actually pay me to come pick up my old fridge. Double win? Yes. So I went on the peco website, filled out the information, realized it had to be working and plugged in when they picked it up and continued to schedule the pick up. I ran an extension cord out through the window to plug-in the fridge to prove that it still worked (which it did, just not very well). I also had to put the doors back on (which I did half way – aka didn’t screw everything tight) to keep the cold in. I also scrubbed it and hosed it down, cause I’m crazy and weird. Having it on the porch was actually very convenient since I didn’t technically have to be there for the pick up. They just unplugged and hauled it away. I wish I could share more of the process with ya, but I didn’t get to witness the pick up first hand. We do have that fridge in the basement that we don’t use (and I have no idea if it even works!) and I plan on doing the same process to remove this one as well.

The Range and The Dishwasher.
This is where Craigslist came in. Wow. So I snapped some photos of my appliances. Loaded them up to Craigslist as Free, and that they needed to pick up, and WOW the amount of responses. Now these weren’t any glamour shots, but maybe the brick wall helped.

 

I guess a brick wall helps sell anything really cause I must admit, they do look prettier somehow. I wrote in the write up that both worked well, which they did and I fully disclosed that the range drawer wasn’t flush. Still got about 50 emails in a few short hours. Heck, my first email came in “are they still available!?” Mind you this was about 2 minutes after I posted the listing. Haha. Some of the responses I got were just comical. So somehow I picked someone through the insane amount of responses (I finally took it off craiglist after I realized they weren’t slowing), set up a time with the girl and whamp bam, she picked em up with her parents and they were no longer my problem. Front porch clean and 100% less white trashy. Phew. I may need to make a special email address next time though when I decide to craigslist something. I felt horrible for my phone receiving such an intense amount of crap email. Or maybe I actually could have gotten some kind of money for them. Who knows.

Anyone else have a crazy first experience with craigslist? Happy weekend everyone! I’ve got my bro’s graduation party tomorrow (yay celebrating!  …and we’re doing it fiesta style – I’ll try to grab some decor pics) and a bridal shower on Sunday. And maybe, just maybe we’ll hit up the stores and pick out a pendant light! Busy Busy!