And we're off!

On a kitchen remodel this time. Yes, I know, it's not the garden.  Maybe it's time to rename this blog! But this is where the kitchen transformation is going to go.

We have now lived in our house just a few months shy of 29 years.  And we have put up with the poorly designed and sadly dated kitchen for far, far too long.  We have, at the utmost, five feet of working counter space. And that's if there aren't any dirty dishes! It's barely manageable with one person cooking, but when we're both working on a meal, it's bloody impossible.  I'm in front of what Joe needs, or he has to move to let me in - and 2 square feet of space each simply isn't enough room to work.

We did the kitchen once before, but it was all cosmetic: new counter, new sink, wallpaper - that kind of thing. This time it's a real remodel.

To understand all this, you just have to see where we started. Just don't judge how I look, please. It was 1985 and we all made bad choices.

Yep, that's what it looked like when we moved in (and yes, we were broke - see the folding table?).  Note the harvest gold stove and the avocado green fridge...  We suspect the previous owners took better appliances with them and bought these to just have something in the house. We have no proof, but who would purposefully buy appliances in 2 colors? And note how well neither one goes with the black and green swirled linoleum floor.  My favorite had to be the brown linoleum countertop. Don't they all go well together? I know from recent research that linoleum was very commonly used for countertops in bungalows, but if this really went in when the house was built, it was 60 years old in these pictures! No soft surface like linoleum holds up for 60 years. We NEVER put food directly on it. The surface was so full of cuts and dings that we worried all kinds of nasty stuff might be lurking in the cracks.  Same with the built-in cutting board. The sink is likely original, too, as a white undermount sink was dirt common in bungalows.

Did you know the Merriam Branch of the St. Paul Public Library system has a large collection of books about bungalows? The Twin Cities  Bungalow Club donated books to start the collection, and now donates money every year to keep it going! If we were planning to recreate the kitchen as it was in 1925, that would have been a tremendous resource. But we're going for the flavor instead.

The yellow on the walls is actually better than what's under it. I have nothing against green (actually, I love it), but not this shade in a relatively dark kitchen - you'll see it soon.  And what they did to the floor...

You can see the entire counter in the top picture.  Yep, that's it.  That's all the space we've got. You can certainly understand our frustration!

The first room we redid (other than paint) was the bathroom. It got priority because some misguided soul had put plastic tile on the walls.  The pink wasn't so awful, but the plastic meant the walls weren't waterproof and we couldn't really use a shower. So we had ceramic tile installed, along with an actual shower. It was a good choice - I'm still glad we did it and I still like the tile!

But the kitchen was next. We simply couldn't afford to do anything major, and, in fact, did all the work ourselves along with my dad. Dumb us - we started when Kendra was only a few days old, as that's when my folks were here. I will say that was about the only time Kendra slept - when all the banging was going on. I think she shut down to block out all the overstimulating noise!

Dad and Joe added some plugs and other wiring, giving us some undercabinet lighting and a light over the sink. They've never given us an issue, but it turns out they were not done according to code, so that all has to come out. I'm not sure if code changed or if we just didn't do it right. Doesn't much matter now.  They put in a new sink and installed a new countertop. Oh, what a difference that made...  We found out there'd been a fire at some time, and had to patch the backsplash on the right side of the sink. We used the opportunity to stuff insulation behind upper and lower cabinets, but the kitchen is still dang cold in the winter. I  measure the temp in the top cabinets this past January, and the right side (exposed on 2 walls) was 55 degrees!

Then they did the floor. Joe battled to get that awful green/black stuff up. I think it came up in shards. He took a chunk to Menard's (I think to see if they had any suggestions as to how to better remove it) and the experienced guy there said it was the second ugliest floor he'd ever seen.  I shudder to think what the ugliest was. Under the linoleum, we found this (note the counter, sink and backsplash are done - and see the new curtains my mom made):

And under that - maple flooring.  Uh-huh. They covered a gorgeous maple floor with this junk. We decided we simply didn't have the time or resources necessary to refinish the floor.  I honestly don't know if it was even possible, as this glue might have penetrated so far into the floor that removing it would have entailed sanding the wood too thin to be salvageable. So we elected to put down subflooring with peel and stick tile over. Not a great choice, but what we could afford. Dad and Joe put down the subfloor and filled in all the holes and seams. Then they sanded.  Mom, Kendra and I left the house during this, and came back to find they hadn't blocked the kitchen off from the rest of the house, and the dust had gone everywhere. Neither forgot to seal a room off again...

Joe and Dad put up the tile backsplash, too. You'll hear more about that later...

We didn't do anything to the cabinets.  About six months later, Joe's sister-in-law showed us how to hang wallpaper. She told us if we managed to do that together without wanting to kill each other, our marriage would last. Probably not a bad test - but I guess we passed.

And that's all we've done to the kitchen - until now. I doubt any of you have seen it any other way.