Kitchen Nightmares

[steepholm]

What could be more boring than hearing about someone else's home renovations? Nothing - so feel free to move swiftly on, but just for the record I'll mention that we're currently camping in the house, the kitchen being out of action while it is combined with what was a downstairs toilet to make... a slightly bigger kitchen. Not a big kitchen, mind, just not the phone-box sized one I've lived with for the last 12 years. Meanwhile I have no washing machine (it's shivering in the snow outside my back door), no oven, no grill, no hob, no sink, no water at all on the ground floor, and the contents of all the drawers and cupboards are scattered around the house - a house with no storage to speak of. Our living room contains the fridge-freezer, microwave, bins, toaster, and food, while the kettle sits in my bedroom, one tantalising wall distant from the bathroom taps.

Overall, it's not as chaotic as I thought it would be, but I'll still be very glad when it's over. According to the builder it's a two-week job, which we're now halfway through. Here a couple of pics from the first day:



And at the end of the first week.



I assure you there's more progress than might first appear... Actually I've no complaints to make, so far - the builders seem to know what they're doing, and they're on schedule, but I won't be happy till I've filled those new cupboards.

Comments

[shewhomust]

I'm sure it will be wonderful when it's done - but you have certainly chosen an interesting season to be without hot food!

[steepholm]

The microwave is some help there, but I am finding that it doesn't take long to get very sick indeed of ready meals!

[cmcmck]

Know the feeling!

Our kitchen is on the list of to dos!

[steepholm]

Well, good luck when you get there! It may indeed to be wiser to choose a clementer season.

[lamentables]

I hated having our kitchen renovated, but it was completely worth the pain & trauma. I hope the second week goes smoothly and quickly.

[steepholm]

It's good to hear that "It Gets Better".

[kalypso]

This is a subject of great interest to me, because I hope to have the kitchen revamped later this year, when I get the money from the life insurance policy connected to the mortgage (I cleared the mortgage using my mother's legacy, so have earmarked the policy for home improvements). I am rather nervous about it all, as I don't have a microwave and don't particularly want to buy one just for the duration. But that's a good point made below about picking a season when I could live on cold food!

It's also interesting to be able to poke my nose into someone else's house, and I hope we will see photos of the final shiny new kitchen when it's ready. Is the downstairs toilet being abolished altogether or can you squeeze it in anywhere else on the ground floor? My joiner and I have been speculating this week about whether some of the peculiarities of the current kitchen sink are caused by the previous residents running the exit pipe into what he surmises was the exit for a toilet in the coal room (which the far end of the kitchen once was). I'm fairly sure the present downstairs toilet (under the stairs) was their work. The husband worked for a bathroom company, which may account for the number of basins around the house.

[steepholm]

Work is proceeding apace, and many of the new cupboards are now in. Theoretically the job should be finished by the end of the week (touch formica), and when it is I'll show you pics!

I do find a microwave quite handy, and their not expensive these day, but I agree it seems a bit OTT to buy one just for a few weeks.

[kalypso]

Hope all will go well and you'll have a dream kitchen by the weekend!

A couple of house moves ago, my mother came down to help and brought her microwave to tide us over until an oven was delivered, but I can't think of anyone I could reasonably ask to lend me one now. Someone tried to persuade me that next time I bought an oven I should get one with a microwave where the grill is in the current one, but I use the grill all the time so am reluctant to lose it.

[ethelmay]

We have a portable induction burner that we got to try out induction cooking (still haven't bought a new stove, but it probably will be induction when we ever do). It comes in pretty handy and isn't as much of a fire hazard as portable coil burners always seem like to me.