Cabinets and Doors

The cabinets all got installed and the paint crew got busy on clear coating them along with the doors.

These are just some of the doors after the first coat of clear varnish.  You can see how it made them just the tiniest bit darker. But it also brought out the beauty of the grain of the Knotty Alder.

They also did all the cabinets as well and the shelves in the pantry.

Very happy with the job that they did and we are just one step closer to being done.

Doors are all finished and stacked up waiting to be reinstalled.

Heres a picture of a finished door so you can see a bit of a sheen on it but it's very low.  

Here's the door installed with the Hardwear.  Bob and I got tired of waiting for someone to do it so we did.  

More Cabinet Stuff and Range Hood

I'm pretty sure this will be boring for many of you but I believe that the heart and soul of the home is the kitchen.  At least for me it is.  It's where I best express my love for my family in the food that I make and prepare for them.  It's the room I spend the most time in and the room I am most comfortable in.  That being said, the cabinets cannot be just a mishmash of whatever fits goes.  It has to make sense and it has to be in the right place for the task I am performing.  So like with the old house I took my time designing my kitchen.  I needed it to make sense to me and the way I go about working in it.

Now most professional designers will talk about the work triangle, and that is sink, range and refrigerator.  For me to have the smallest triangle doesnt make any sense.  I want the stove and range as far away from each other as I can get them and the sink in between the 2.  I loved, loved, loved my old kitchen.  It was perfect for me and a LOT of food came out of that kitchen and I fed literally hundreds of people in the 20 years we were there. 

So the old kitchen was an "L" shaped affair and this one is similar but a bit abbreviated in that it's got a shorter upright.  But I also have a whole room that is a pantry and a much larger island so I have plenty of counter space.  

So this is my old kitchen set up.  I had to take this from the AirBnB page cause I couldn't put my hands on a picture that I had.  But you get the idea of a backward kind of L.

Hers the new kitchen.  On your left in the empty space between the 2 cabinets will be my range.  Sink is under the window and fridge goes in that big hole to the right of those 2 upper cabinets.  Island is front and center.  

Heres a picture with the range hood now in place.  

The cabinet to the left of the range is for cookie sheets, cupcake tins and cake rounds. 

Here is a picture from the top.  And this "drawer" slides out.  

The side of the island that faces out toward the dining and living area will hold most, if not all of my cookbooks.  Overflow can go into pantry if necessary.

On the other side is two cabinets with 4 sliders in each.  One cabinet will hold all the baking supplies, measuring cups, spoons, specialty tools, rolling pins and parchment paper.  Other cabinet will hold nothing but cooking items and the lower levels will hold casserole dishes, pyrex bakers and my 2 cutting boards by Boos.  

Next to that will be my undercounter fridge and freezer drawers by Sub-Zero.  Go big or go home!

Directly across from that is my stand up pantry with various adjustable shelves and several drawers.  This will hold Flour, sugars, spices and herbs, salts, peppers, oatmeal and cream of wheat.  The drawers will hold some pots and pans and their lids.  To the right of the dishwasher are drawers that will have silverware, napkins dish towels and probably a drawer devoted to wax paper, aluminum foil and plastic wrap.  Next to the stove to the right will be all the cast iron skillets and stock pots and the cubbie in the corner will probably house the  food processor, my second kitchenaid stand mixer, blender and whatever else I deem necessary.

Upper cabinets will be dishes, everyday and good China.  Above the cubbie for the microwave, to the right of the stove is for the mishmash of plates and bowls that can be used in the microwave.  My everyday dishes I received after my mom.passed.  Its Wedgewood and made long before microwaves were an everybody has one appliance.  I may change my mind about some of these things once I start working and find somethings make more sense over here rather than over there but for right now I think this is the plan going forward.

So something else that we found out much later than should of happened was that we were going to be responsible for putting up the range hood.  Once again, thank you Ronnie!  Normally this is not that complicated of a job BUT because our home is so tight ventilation wise and we use a wood burning stove for heat we have to have something called return air.  That is air that can naturally enter the house, not sucked in.  So in order to do this without making yet another hole in the side is to share the same space that the vent hood uses.  So you have a pipe within a pipe.  The inner pipe is the exhaust from the range hood and the outer pipe is where the return air enters the house.  

Heres a picture of bob installing the inner pipe that carries the exhaust from the range to the outside.  

This is up in the attic where you see that big shiny smooth sided pipe that has the smaller exhaust pipe inside  it.

And there you see it where it hits the wall.  

And that dryer looking vent thing is where it vents to the outside.  Another job we were both dreading finished.  

Granite people are supposed to be here this week measuring.  Our well man Charlie should be here midweek to install water conditioner and the paint crew will finish up with the little bit that they have left to do.  

Cabinets!!

My cabinets arrived today!!

They are made out of knotty alder and are shaker style.  Very similar to my old ones except that my old ones were knotty pine.

Two above are just different angles of the kitchen.

This drawer will hold cookie sheets, half sheet pans, cupcake tins and cooling racks. I'm taking the picture from above.

This is stand up kitchen pantry for things like spices, herbs, seasonings and the like.  I have adjustable shelves above and below those 2 slide out drawers.

Guest bath vanity.

Master bath vanity...kind of a his and hers side.  

And mud room cubbie for laundry detergent, cleaning supplies and what ever else I deam needs to go in there.  

That was all yesterday.  They finish the install today.

Someone is down there now prepping for staining the door frames and spraying the cabinets and pantry shelves.  So we could have someone potentially next week be doing all that.  Which would be great.  

Plumbers were here yesterday and they fixed the leak in the master shower.  I should have checked last night by turning the water back on but I didnt.  They should be here today but of course they arent.  I'm not surprised.  Our attic doors are still not here so that's worrying but we arent scheduled for measuring the cabinets for granite until the week of the 13th so we still have time.  

More Setbacks

We had some great progress on the house and that all came to a screeching stop yesterday afternoon.

First off...progress photos.

House is a little more than halved trimmed.  Dwayne who is doing a great job was here on Monday but hasnt returned.  I have no idea why and I'm a little pissed as to no explanation of why he is not here. 

Bob and I finished the table and started painting the chairs.

We had to finish it with a different brand of polyurethane ( more about shortages in a minute) and it's a bit shinier than we prefer...can said satin...but we are happy with it over all.

So we knew we were gonna need chairs for this table and I didnt really want to buy new but would if we found a good deal.  And then I thought of the brilliant idea of painting the ones we have...why the heck not? 

So here's the chairs we have (8 total)

I was thinking that we could paint them black but Bob suggested we paint them "Oil brushed Bronze" to kinda match the table base.  So that's what we did.

Its not black though it appears that way in the picture.  It's more of a blackish-brownish combo and I think it goes perfectly with the table.  Here's the rub.....apparently now with gas prices being so high EVERYONE from grocery stores to mom and pop shops are having supply chain issues.  This is all due to our incompetent President.  Sorry, my blog, my opinion!  I've seen people on Ebay and Amazon offering this paint now for anywhere between $27 - $40 A CAN!!  That's gouging anyway you look at it!  Its downright shameful but if pipelines hadnt been shut down then we wouldn't be having this issue.  Yes, I know the stockmarket has a lot to do with the price but when there is less of anything then it becomes more valuable.  Enough...off my soapbox.

Our cabinets are coming next week so Bob and I headed to Kempner to pick out our granite for the bathrooms and get on the schedule for measuring.

We found a couple of slabs that were on sale and we thought would go nicely in the bathrooms.  

It has a little maroonish color to it that we thought the sandstone would make "pop" and it was really pleasing to look at.  

So another item checked off the list.

So yesterday afternoon Kirby ( the plumber) and OG ( the electrician) were at the house.  They were supposed to put on the bathroom fixtures and disconnect the light in the bathroom so that the sheetrock above it could be taken out and repaired.  That was where we had the roof leak.  They left not soon after they arrived and we went down to see what they had done.  The fixtures were on in the guest bath but the light was not taken down.  So we  went over to the Masterbath and no fixtures were on the shower. And there appeared to be water on the wall and on the floor.  Not wanting to jump to conclusions we thought we'd wait to see if it dried up or if there was more in the morning.  

These are pictures that I took this morning.

So we shut the water off because we know there is a leak and I texted Ernie.  He said he would be out later that afternoon but everyone else was off until Tuesday.  WTF!! Sorry, so OG and Kirby leave on Thursday, knowing they wont be back till Tuesday and they dont tell us we have a leak?  They have to drive right by the shop and we were there!!

I'm so angry that I could just spit nails.

Ernie came out and of course apologized but that doesnt explain OG's and Kirby's behavior and knowing that NOTHING will be done until at least Tuesday if not beyond that is very frustrating.  If Andre's has to come back and tear down part of the shower structure then its gonna be a real mess.  I just dont understand the lack of thought about this whole situation.  For now, we've turned the water off and we just have to wait and see what happens on Tuesday.  

Cabinets are coming on Monday. 

Pantry and progress

The pantry is completed!  Check another thing off the list.  Dwayne did a great job and I'm very excited to begin filling it up.  I cannot wait to start canning again to see all those freshly canned goods on the shelves.

He also finished the shoe cubbie in the master closet.  This closet is ridiculously large for us as neither one of us is a clothes horse in any fashion.  But there was no way to make it any different because of the way we designed the house.  I was under the impression that when we decided to go with Muse Construction that our plans would either have a professional draw up blueprints and have suggestions or Ronnie would do that himself.  Nope, that didnt happen so the plans stayed as we drew them which wasnt horrible but I would have been open to having the first guest bedroom not have that awkward closet in the corner.  It's fine, after all it is a guest bedroom.  Neither of us have parents that are still living so it's not like someone will be moving in.  

Heres the shoe cubbie.

We could of had Dwayne build out the closet but it kinda seemed like a waste as I didnt really have an idea of what I wanted AND we have a bunch of that Closet Maid stuff that we can use and set up how we like so we decided to go that route. 

Dwayne also started the baseboards and trim around the interior doors so the house is beginning to look more like a house.

On another note we are almost finished with our other project which is the dining room table.

This is the underside of the table.  The plan was to look at all the voids from the bottom to see which ones went all the way through.  We would tape them up and then flip the table to the correct side and fill up those voids with casting resin.  Casting resin is that thick clear plastic like finish you often see on restaurant tables or bar tops.  So that is exactly what we did.

So that's what it looks like from the top and the second picture is after the top set up and we needed to fill in some voids on the sides of the table so we had to tip it up till it set and then do the other side just like it.

Then because we had extra casting resin and some little dips in the table top we decided to do a very thin layer of casting resin over the complete top.  It would level out the top of the table and then we could begin our polyurethane coats.  

Here's the table top sitting on the base.  As you can see it still has a bit of sanding and a couple more coats of polyurethane and it will be finished. 

Pantry

The painters showed back up on Tuesday and finished the clear coat on the trim.  I really, really like it and cannot wait for the trim guys to start putting it up.  

This will give you a sneak peek at what it will look like.  The doors get a bit darker once the clear coat goes on.  

We also finished up with the Septic Tank.  

Yea!  Another one of OUR tasks taken care of.

Trim guy showed up on Wednesday and he wanted to start doing the pantry first so I ran up to the house and got the plan that Bob and I drew up and he got to work.  

This is the end of second day.  Dwayne is not fast but he is precise and I'd much rather the second over the first.  To the right of the shelves there will be a piece of furniture I bought.  It will hold table cloths, and good silver etc.  Probably a couple of appliances on the top as well like the Airfryer, one of my stand mixers etc.

End of 3rd day (Friday).  He has just a little bit to finish up on Monday and then maybe he begins on the trim or he starts in on the shoe cubby.  We are having one built even though we dont have but maybe 7 pairs of shoes between us.  Its gonna hold maybe 8 pair of shoes total but we have "Closetmaid" shelves and stuff for the closet so didnt see a need for him to build anything more than a cubby.  

And as if we dont have enough on our plate we started in on the top for the dining room table. 

This is the underside.  We originally had slabs of raw wood.  Wood that had been just cut so the sides were uneven and had bark on parts of it.  We were given several names of people to contact about planing the boards and then dowling them together.  Most of those we contacted never returned our calls or priced it way too high.  So in desperation I called our cabinet people who gave us a name and he wasnt too far away from where we live.  So we called him and Bob took the wood over and he decided to tongue and groove the boards together instead of dowling.  Said it was a much better way to keep any of the boards from warping or getting out of alignment.  

As you can see there are voids in the wood.  Those have to be filled up with something so we made dam like structures around them so we could fill the voids up with casting resin.  The underside of the voids are covered with tape to keep the resin from dripping out.  You use just regular old masking tape.  Anyway you pour the casting resin in the voids and sometimes the smallest voids take more resin than you think.  You go up to the edge of the dam and then wait for it to cure.  It's pretty hot here so in 24 hours it will probably be completely cured.  Then we will sand everything off smooth.  Clean it with a bit of alcohol or acetone and wait for that to dry...1/2 an hour..maybe.  Then we will put on a very thin layer of the casting resin all over the complete table top and down the sides.  Let that dry and then use a satin polyurethane to final coat.  If the casting resin came in a satin finish we would use that but it does not..only shiny and we want it to match the light above it.  

Has to look bad before it looks beautiful.  

A year and 3 months in.....

Here we are at a year and 3 months.  This week should of been nothing but worker bees around here and we got butkis.  Frustrated is not the word I would use anymore.  I'm just downright angry.

A sample of what went on this week.  Monday the paint and stain guy shows up for us to choose a stain.  He WAS supposed to be here on Friday prior so we could choose and then they would start in Monday but nooooo.  So they did start staining on Tuesday Morning and finished up trim boards on Wednesday.  Mind you these painting people start at around 7:30 but are gone around 2:30.  It's just the way it is.  Thursday we had rain so I didnt expect them to be back because all of the staining  and finishing is going on outside.  No biggie but Friday was gorgeous and they were no shows.  I was hoping that they would be putting that sealing coat on and by Monday the trim guys could start in on the trim.  Not happening.  Then the trim guy was supposed to be here on Thursday to talk about the layout of my pantry.  Bob and I worked on a plan to make the best use of the space and so I was ready so he could begin laying it out and cutting boards so they could be clear coated.  But he didnt show.  And last but not least and the one that makes me most angry was Kerby the Plummer was supposed to be here from Wednesday on to put in my tub ( should of been done six months ago), put all fixtures on tub and showers, hook up hot water heaters and install the whole house filter.  On Wednesday they put on the fixtures to the tub only ( a five minute job and I could of done it and saved them a trip).  Thursday  the excuse was that it was raining and he didnt want to mess up my floor.  Well, where he would be walking would be covered by paper still so for just that reason that doesn't wash in my book.  Friday the Supervisor for the GC told me they would be there.  By 1:30pm I texted him and asked if they were on their way.  Apparently they decided not to come...they meaning Kerby and his driver.  Kerby had a mini stroke about 2 months ago while driving and so the company has another sub O.G. who is an electrician driving him and helping him.  But they'd be here Monday morning.  So I texted back and told the supervisor that if the cabinet people come on Monday and want to set that cabinet first, I'm not stopping them.  If that cabinet is set then the limited space Kerby has to work in will be even more limited and if he screws up the tub then I will hold him personally responsible.  He will find another tub to fit that space( not easy to do and it has to be the correct color).  I'm fed up and angry because we have become the red headed step children.  For those not familiar with that Texas saying, it means that somehow we have become persona non grata.  Nobody gives a shit if this house ever gets finished and nobody is doing anything differently to make sure we make that date of June 1st.

Oh and to just top off the week I found a leak in the bathroom.  Dont know if you can see it in this picture but that is not a shadow around the top of the light fixture.  That is moisture.  When I went up to the attic to look I couldn't find where it was coming from but it's been going on a while because the sheetrock above has mold on it.  Someone will be here Monday morning to check it out...yeah, right....