Jack and Katrina's Place

This summer we got our kitchen rebuilt. The kitchen was the original, as built with the house in 1989 and while we've redeocrated all the other rooms in the house over the years, the kitchen remined in the 80's. Finally the sliders that held up the knives and forks drawer completely failed, they'd been grinding metal on metal after the ball bearings fell out a few years ago and finally the runners failed and the drawer fell out into the one elow. While installing new runners was technically possible, when you got up close to the doors they were all starting to swell where water had got into the MDF boards,,,so new kitchen time had finally arrived.

 

Before we could get busy we had to move the contents of the kitchen into the garage, and set up a temporary 'camp kitchen'. Good civil defence practice to break out our earthquake kit.

So then we could start the demolition! This was followed by a brief moment of wondering what on earth we'd done, oh well committed to fixing it up now!

The chaos only lasted a few days before the builder and plasterer arrived to start fixing things up

Then there was a few nights and weekend hours of 'owner input' painting the walls and window sills, oh and the window sills in the dining room to match, oh and the doors in the dining room, oh and the dining room doorway trims, all reasons why things take longer than you first thought.

Then the new cabinetry could be delivered, this is what a new kitchen looks like in a truck

But they got busy installing them and by 14th Feb we could operate in the kitchen, no power or water but better than the camp kitchen in the garage.

The start of the pantry, there used to be a doorway here to the laundry.

 Stocking the pantry again, no appliances yet.

This installation of the rotating pantry shelves allowed the kitchen project to achieve one of its key deliverables, a place for Katrina to put the Kenwood mixer she had so long desired. I suspected this was the real reason for the whole upgrade, but,

I had my favourite coffee drinking spot reinstated so I was OK with that.

By the end of February the new bench top arrived engineered stone, (or flash terrazzo). The sink is the 20 year old one repolished. Why?  Because new ones don't have draining boards (not fashionable), but you need them when you have to wash stuff for kids all day. Also the old sink was not worn out, actually how would a sink wear out? unless you scrub it with 80 grit sandpaper every night?

 

By first week of March the plumbers, electricians and cabinet men had finished and the job was effectively done, well not quite because we had elected to leave the wall covering (splash back) out of the contract and decide on colours and materials once the kitchen was in. That proved hard to do, just hard to concentrate on a colour chart for long or visit showrooms with 8 month old Will and Guy of course. But nonetheless we painted pieces of card with test pots and tried different paint finished including sparkly metallic, (mmm still want to find a place to use that!). Here is Katrina skyping her friend Margaret and showing her 'virtual' friend around the kitchen. Something tells me we'll laugh at this picture in less than 10 years, 'remember when laptops weighed about a kilo'.

So we spent most of April thinking about it before we stumbled across some cool tiles, that were on a great special, and talked to a salesperson who really had some great ideas. We went for tiles instead of splash back because a splash back in any feasible colour was going to be a rather large and monotonous expanse. Tiles allowed us to add some interest, without overpowering the adjacent lounge and dining room. Oh and they were on special, like really on special, like about $200 all up. So the tile man came (more than $200 but well wortht it) and he did an awesome job last week and here it is, Katrina's new kitchen in the evening and in the glorious autumn morning light May 25,

Now you see what the hole is for, looking out window while washing dishes

Pantry doors slide closed, and an internal light comes on when open to reveal coffee/toast bar.