The Hanson Family: Kitchen projects... a love/hate relationship

If you've seen the before pics of our kitchen, you KNOW we've needed to do something about the kitchen for, well, ever. Cosmetic changes wouldn't even be enough. The pumkin-spice-painted-faux-paneling walls and retro cabinet hardware are easy fixes, but that would only scratch the surface of the updating this kitchen needs. We got an over-the-range microwave for Christmas from my folks, but we couldn't install it until Dad and Brandon had a plan for updating the wiring in the wall and a plan for implementing said plan. Wiring may be the place to start the story of the evolution of our kitchen.

When we moved in, Brandon and I tried to create a key for the breaker box, so we could go straight to the correct breaker for whatever project we needed to work on. That was a FI-AS-CO. We determined as well as we could that, in the kitchen, ALL the appliances were wired to the SAME BREAKER. BIG no-no. Code violation, fire hazard. (It's the same story throughout the house.) And in the instructions for all major appliances, it says each appliance must have its own dedicated outlet. Soooo... In order to install the microwave (and a dishwasher), new wiring had to be run through the cabinets and under the floor (without punching holes in the paneling, because that's impossible to fix without a big seam), outlets installed for each appliance, then the wiring for each appliance had to be connected to the breaker box. Whew.

Here's the new microwave:

The next project was the dishwasher. In most cases, getting a new dishwasher is a cake walk. Buy dishwasher. Remove old one. Hook up new one to plumbing and electrical. Slide gently into place and secure. Voila. Like I said before, though. We had to add all new wiring. Oh, and cut a big hole in the cabinetry for the dishwasher to fit it!

Here's the hole for the dishwasher:

Tomorrow I'll add pics of the finished product. Now I'm going to rant about why I hate kitchen projects.

Mostly, this is why:

All my stuff is displaced from their storage areas, and placed in plain view. NOT my favorite part of any project, but it's just worse in the kitchen. I have to work around all the stuff, because even during a project, the kitchen still has to function for our family. And not having running water for so long, the dishes have REALLY piled up. And the dirty clothes. And the need for showers and baths (Yes, in fact, that is part of some aspects of renovations. It stinks. {Heehee.}). OK, that part actually only lasted for 2 days, not all week. Still gross? Maybe. (definitely.)

Also, an additional project we have going is disguising the paneling to look like sheetrock. I'll blog more about that once I have one wall finished, and I'll give a step-by-step run-down of our process. Basically, we're using joint compound, or drywall mud, to fill the seams of the paneling. After 3-4 heavy coats of joint compound and lots of sanding, ibuprofen, and dirty rags, then primer and paint, the wall should look just like a sheetrock-clad wall. Time and labor intensive? Yes. Cost effective? YES. More on that later. Here's the start of it:

And here's what we did with the buffet:

More junk. I looked and looked for the can opener last night. After maybe a half hour of searching, happened to find it in a box of junk among the other junk on the buffet.

We're playing with the idea of using the buffet as an island or peninsula, but right not I'm not feeling it. I also can't stand to be in the kitchen for any longer than it takes to fix Wes a drink and a sandwich.

We dined outside last night, because the whole table was covered in more junk (did you expect anything else?), and I was tired of looking at the mess in the living room. EVERY normal cleaning chore has halted with the absence of water in the house. Wes didn't mind, though. And Brandon even set up the kiddie pool for him to play in while he grilled.