La Nouvelle Cuisine

Here's where we started. Looks nice...In a photograph!

Officially started Oct 30th when we place the cabinet order for delivery Monday.

-Halloween we emptied the cupboards and had the last supper so to speak.

-Monday Nov 1: Lorne and the guy who bought them took out the old cabinets. The pantry toppled over and a week later my leg is still rather swollen. Ouch!

-Tuesday Nov 2: Removed the bulkhead over where the pantry was. Took out the goofy angled cutout in the corner by the old microwave. Looks perfect now. Corrine and I spent ~ 3 hours flipping breakers trying to figure out what is on which breaker so I can turn off all the kitchen for a few days. This place is wired WEIRDLY.

-Wed Nov 3: Replaced drywall where bulkhead was and patched all the holes in walls nice and smooth (so the electrician could come in the next day and punch huge holes in it all) . sourced electrician. Corinne and I spent an hour making sure all the parts on the list were delivered (what we DIDN'T do was make sure those were the right parts...)

-Thurs. Nov 4: The cabinet installer and electrician came. Cabinet guy only stayed half day as there wasn't much room to build and install with electrician in the way and there were of course some wrong cabinet parts (I believe there is a guy hired by Ikea who is tasked with mixing up at least 3 things on each order for delivery) that I had to exchange. Electricians got about half done with pot lights etc.

-Friday Nov 5: Electricians (Johnny from Ghana and Hossein from Bangladesh) spent most the day finishing the kitchen then another couple of hours tracing wires to get the basement 3 way switch to finally work right! (someone sometime long ago had cut a ground wire). patched holes in the ceiling and walls

Sat. Nov 6th: Kids and Mom went to world record Yo-Yo attempt at the Zoo (they were a few hundred short of people for the record)

I Found mudder/tapers (Amanzo and Davain, lord knows where they are from. I couldn't even place the language and forgot to ask) to come in for a couple of hours to do a final skim coat on the ceiling (lots of holes from fishing wire for the pots) and wall patches. Cabinet guys (Russians Dimitry and Serge), comes in for half a day and puts up first 3 cabinets and is off again till Tuesday. The job officially qualifies for United Nations of Renos status.

I sand drywall, adjust electrical

Sunday Nov.7: Primed ceiling and patches. Did my first ever plumbing soldering in cutting off the kitchen sink pipes so the cabinet fits over. Didn't burn the house down.

Monday Nov. 8: painted ceiling and found a sheet metal place to make a custom adaptor vent so I don't have to cut a new hole in the brick. Then I had a second custom adaptor made as the first was measured too exact with no tolerance. Lesson learned. Cleaned up dustworld now that the drywall etc is done.

Tuesday Nov. 9: Pick up my new ductwork. Expecting Cabinets to all go in today.

1:30pm: not expecting that anymore :-(

found another batch of missing parts from Ikea. Had them all shipped with the 'lost' shipment from Montreal that they eventually found in their store...

I picked up my custom sheet metal box cut out some wall and customize them to make a cooktop vent adaptor so I don't have to cut a new hole in the wall. Seal it all back up with foam and styrofoam only to realize the microwave/fan now has only tin and styrofoam to hang on! (ie, I cut out the only stud behind it. I need some reeeeally long screws now..

Wed. nov. 10: cabinet guys are back. Ikea delivers some more stuff. went to get all the handles. by the time we get back all the cabinet boxes are in and many of the doors. We also have a new list to go to Ikea with for Missing parts to get, Wrong colour parts to exchange, and extra parts to return. I (usta) love Ikea. I'll be back there again tomorrow as they guys ran out of things to do with no parts to work with.

have a short list of Granite people to choose from tomorrow morning. Electrician coming in tomorrow to finish a couple of things. Sammy the granite guy is supposed to come to measure too.

Thur. Nov. 11: Dimitry and Serge back to try to finish. Still some things they need to bring so they call it a day at noon. The electrician, due to come at noon became unreachable and called to cancel after he got home at 7pm. Reschedule for Saturday. Sammy continually says he's coming to measure and bring samples, but a little later, after the noon appointment we had. He finally arrived around 8pm. He suddenly took on a used car salesman persona. I quickly realized I really didn't want the $500 undercoating.

Fri. Nov 12: We wanted 21" (because it fit) pullout pantry doors but Ikea doesn't sell them and the cabinet guy said they don't make them. So, I found a local welder to cut down a 24"Ikea drawer back so I can make custom drawers. Back to Craigslist to find a better granite place. Drove to one near the welder that seemed good. They are a Chinese family run business and seem to know what they are doing. Sha Min comes out in the afternoon to measure and does a meticulous job. I think we got the right guys this time.

Sat Nov 13: Dimitry is back at it and electricians Hossien and Johnny finally arrive too. I recruited Dave Lee to help move the oven out of the garage. It's been there with the cooktop for just over a year since I got it, off craigslist of course. New oven breaker doesn't fit so I head to my other home away from home (Ikea being the first), Homedepot, for a new one and to pick up our Blanco diamond 1.75 Biscotti sink (check it out). They don't have the weird old breaker I need but I eventually find a weird old electrical supply store that has one for only $65! The oven goes in and the trades are done for the day by noonish. I run the sink and the cooktop out to the granite guy (he wants to do all the custom final grinding at the shop as to not cover the house with dust. good thinking!) and back to home depot of course.

Corinne asks the kids where they would like to go out for dinner. "IKEA!" LOL. Ok, I have to exchange more stuff anyway...

Corinne and I take the oven apart and 'detail' it. Looks great! Hope it cooks great...

More Pictures soon.

And the story goes on..