New Fridge

We had to buy a new washer and fridge over Memorial day weekend. Nathan was in the middle of a washing marathon, when the motor quit on our old washer. It was old, but it served us well. We had also been checking the temperature in the fridge for a week. When it gets above 75 degrees outside, the fridge quits making ice, runs constantly and doesn't stay very cold. Memorial Day weekend was hot and the fridge didn't get below 45 degrees. We headed to Lowes for new appliances. They were delivered Tuesday evening.

The kids were sooo excited when the truck arrived.

Everest and Leaf, helping take off the plastic wrapping. Everest was serious about getting all the plastic off.

Our new fridge....well, at least for 2 days. This fridge was a nightmare. It is a very long story, so I will give you the short version. The gasket would not seal on the fridge door, the cooling element was broken, and so was the door sensor. While I was putting the kids to bed, Nathan started playing with all the fancy buttons, one of which was the door alarm. It started beeping loudly. The kids freaked because they thought it was a tornado siren. Nathan and I tried everything to get the alarm off, but since the door wouldn't seal, it wouldn't shut off. He even called Lowes and they didn't know what to do. After 2 hours of reading, and pushing buttons, we put a ratchet strap around it to hold the door shut. It worked for about 45 minutes and then the alarm would go off again.We had to get up push on the fridge and reset the alarm. This happened THE ENTIRE NIGHT! We were both exhausted, it didn't occur to us, until morning to unplug it. We ended up getting a new fridge on Saturday and we love it. In the meantime we lost a lot of food, but the beer fridge and the neighbors fridge came in handy. Thanks Brad and Jeaneen!

Cooking- Kitchen Fun

Wow! This was taken when we first moved into our house in August 2009! Everest looks so little!. He and Leaf still love playing in the kitchen. Everest is getting old enough that he helps in some real cooking. He still loves to be helpful.

He wanted to cook, like me. We had a discussion about ONLY playing like this if 1. he asks and I am right there, 2. the oven is not in use or does not feel warm. He is very good about staying away from the oven when it is warm. Even now, that we have torn the kitchen apart and the oven has been in the middle of the floor so we can do the drywall and windows.

Look how long his hair was. He looks so different now with short hair. He still wears his apron often.

Making sure dinner is done. When Leaf got a kitchen from my parents, I ordered kid size oven mitts. I got them from Montessori Services, kids can really use them for hot things. They are so cute.

I can barely remember the kitchen like this. It has been almost a year since we tore down the walls. I do not miss them AT ALL! I love my new kitchen, even though it is not done yet. We are getting there. Slowly, but we are doing it ourselves. Although we are exhausted from staying up working until 1 or 2 am, we both enjoy doing the work and working together.

Cabinet fun

Hmmmmmm....does anyone know where Everest and Leaf might be?????????
I think I see some fingers.....

...and some toes.

There they are.

kitchen

We have been busy in the kitchen...but not cooking. We started remodeling our kitchen last May. Almost a year later we have settled on a plan and started working on it. We knew this would be a year long project, mostly because we are doing the work ourselves, but also because we wanted to "live with it" to make sure it was what we wanted. I am so glad we did. Over the past 6 months our plan has changed many times. We cut the old cabinets and counter top apart and made an island with them. We changed the spacing of the island and the size, then we decided we wanted the oven in a different place. And then we changed again and decided on a cooktop and built in oven. 

Our plan looks different than it did last May, but I am very happy with our decisions. Nathan and our neighbor Brad, put down Hardibacker getting ready to do the tile work. Leaf supervised the project.

Almost done. Thank you Brad for helping and Jeaneen for entertaining the kids and I for the day.

Here is what the finished kitchen will look like, in terms of space. We have ordered our cabinets, they will be in in 5 weeks. We are doing a lot over Spring Break, I will upload picture when I get time.

So far, so good....

We worked on the kitchen most of the weekend. Sunday, I was very tired and didn't help as much, but Nathan had Everest and my dad to help. Monday we started rearranging the kitchen the way we want it to look. Nathan had to move the stove, fridge, lights and light/outlet switches. I didn't have a preference on where the fridge went, but Nathan thought it would go best between the kitchen and dining room area. It turns out, I love it there. It is so much more convenient. 

Nathan cutting out the bulk head and checking out the light above the sink.

 

Nathan working on removing the florescent light. Neither of us likes this light. He also cut out the rest of the bulk head. Dad- making sure everything is ok. He helped out a lot. Thanks dad!

Dad thought it would be easier to pull all the ceiling down, instead of trying to patch it. It turns out it was a good thing, the builders used roofing nails to nail up the ceiling (you are supposed to use screws). Over time the nails started coming out and the ceiling was hanging about 1/4 inch lower  than it should (not the end of the world, but not a good sign either). We need to fix the rest of the ceiling throughout the house. We noticed bulges in areas when we moved in. Now we know it is the nail heads coming through. Nathan is going to put screws in all the dry wall and then patch or refinish the ceiling. A project for another day.
Check out the lights....Nathan put in recessed lighting. I like it so much better.

Everest really wanted to help Nathan hook the stove up into its new home. He was very helpful. He loves wearing the head lamp to help. These pictures are a little grainy, it was getting late and we didn't have as much light to work with.

Here is one side of my new kitchen. We are hodge podgeing our existing cabinets together for now. We want to live with it for a few weeks, while we decide if this is the way we want it. We are also using the time to figure out what types of cabinets and counter tops we want and if we will buy them or build them.

We want some type of floor to ceiling pantry type shelving by the door and an 8 foot island with a breakfast bar. We will also put in a window by the stove and pantry. So for now, my cupboard sizes do not match, my floor and ceiling are not finished, and my counter top is in 3 pieces, but I don't care. We want to make sure we like this before we invest the money into cabinets, tile and windows.

Once we get the cabinets situated the way we think we want them, I will post more pictures of that. For now, this is my kitchen and I love it. I was able to hold a conversations with my mom, who was sitting in the living room, while I was making dinner. It was really nice to be able to see and talk to her, and also see what she and the kids were up to.

Help from the boys

Nathan and I went to dinner Saturday evening. We had been looking forward to a nice dinner at a local Steak and Seafood restaurant. We have heard wonderful things about McGraws. People have told us to make reservations, but I completely forgot. We figured with Memorial Day weekend everyone would be grilling out. We were wrong. I called ahead of time (we were already dressed up), and they told us the earliest they could get us in would be 8:45, more than 3 hours wait. We were both hungry so we went to a local bar/restaurant, the Black Sparrow. The food was good, we were a little over dressed, but they were not too busy.

The whole time at dinner, we discussed our progress and plans for the kitchen. As soon as we got home, Nathan got to work again (in his nice clothes)

This is what the wall looked like when we got home. I started emptying out cupboards and Nathan tore them out.

We worked until about 10 and then called it a night. Most cupboard are down on the other side of the wall. Just in time.

The boys came home around 11:30 Everest was so excited to help out. We found his safety glasses (I got them from Montessori Services- they have real life stuff in kid sizes), and let him go to work. He tore down the majority of the wall. Leaf helped too, but he was in his birthday suit so no pictures to share.

Everest really getting into demolition. We have to be careful, he keeps going around the house asking if he can tear down the other walls.

Everest worked for a good hour or so. He was tired. He took a 3 hour nap later in the day. Maybe we can get him a job with a moving company and a demolition company.

No more walls. Hurray!! Wait til you see the what we have done today! I will try to post again tomorrow.

We have done a lot of clean up, and more clean up, and more clean up. I am sure we will have a lot more clean up in the next few weeks. We were supposed to do only one wall for now, but ended up removing 2 and a lot more.

This is what happens.....

This is what happens when Nathan and I are left alone for 2 days without kids. It has been 4 1/2 years since we have had more than a few hours alone. Most people would be having their "romantic time", which we did, but we also miss working on the house together. Something that is 10 times harder with 2 little kids.

We have hated this wall since the day we looked at the house. The house feels too compartmentalized for us. We love the open floor plans. I am not fond of the kitchen so we decided to change it! This is phase one!

 View from the living room.

My parents took the boys to a local hotel where they went swimming and out to dinner. Today, they went to the Imagination Station, which is like a small children's museum, and swimming again. 

Nathan and I went to dinner last night at Peaceful Greens. It is a new vegetarian restaurant in downtown Lafayette. It was really nice and the food was EXCELLENT! I had an incredible portabella sandwich and Nathan had a burrito.

The wall is coming DOWN!

No more dry wall. I can see out the front window from my kitchen. I love the view...and the light!

Our biggest challenges was going to be matching the hard wood floor. We only needed a little bit, but getting it the same was going to be tricky. To our surprise, the hard wood floor was under the wall. We are not sure why, but who cares. It stops at the kitchen, but we are going to tile the kitchen so it doesn't matter.

Very dirty!

Hurray! We got it done in a matter of an afternoon. It is not done by any means, but it has been started and there is no turning back. I love my husband.

Nathan saw our friends Courtney and Matt's house a few weeks ago. They have an open floor plan, except for the bedrooms and bathrooms. We both love it. The house we thought we were going to buy last year had an open floor plan (we put in a full price offer on a Frank Lloyd Wright style house, that had had no interest for over 60 days. The day we put in an offer, someone else put in one too and they got the house instead of us. Sad, I know. But if we would have gotten our dream house, we never would have met Doug and Lisa, so I guess it has been worth it.) 
Our plans are to knock out the wall between the kitchen and dining room too. We have to move the stove and fridge. The kitchen is my least favorite room in the house, and it is the room I spend the most time in. We are putting in a 9 foot island, tiling the floor and a back splash for the stove. This may take us the next year to be completely finished, but as long as it is functional, I am ok with that.