It has been about 7 years since we added a second story to our home. Although we've continued to improve our front and back yards, the only things we've done indoors have been minor projects like replacing grout and installing an attic fan. Our home still looks great, but 7 years of living and eating and playing and partying and containing 3 active (and messy) kids has taken its toll. What was once a newsworthy remodel that people actually paid to see has been getting a bit shabby around the edges. So we decided it was high time to freshen up our home, and we decided to start with the kitchen.
That was almost 3 months ago.
The photo above was taken on November 21, the day we started on Phase 1, kitchen cabinet refacing. How I laugh when I read what I posted on Facebook: I'll take daily pictures. We should be done within a week. Famous last words, much like George Bush's Mission Accomplished speech.
Well, we always knew that one week would was a best-case scenario. We know from past experience that the old adage when it comes to contractors -- double the time and double the money -- is all too true, so we doubled the guy's estimate and figured 2 weeks would be plenty. It ended up taking 4 weeks exactly. I wrote the final check on December 19 -- and technically they're still not done because they have to come back to reinstall a couple of doors and do some touchup work. Although the cabinets turned out beautifully in the end, we became quite disheartened by the contractor's pace of work, griping about how long he was taking.
Gosh, these words are starting to taste pretty good, because I keep having to eat them. Alfie and I started Phase 2 and 3, Window Restoration and Wall Painting, around 2 weeks before the cabinets were done. We figured we would be done by mid-December; we're still not done. Like our kitchen contractor, we discovered how old houses have a way of creating a ton of extra refitting and adjusting. Everything takes longer to fix because nothing lies straight, beams and walls and moldings sag here and there, ancient wood and plaster split and crumble. When you fix something, something else breaks. To quote our contactor: This kitchen hates me!
This has been a long, frustrating process, swallowing up all of our weekends and most of our evenings, but we are finally starting to see light at the end of the tunnel. Now that the end is near, I'm getting really excited, and I can finally start to blog about it. But I won't be making any predictions about exactly when that end date is going to arrive. I don't want to end up like Harold Camping, stroking out because his end-of-the-world predictions didn't come true, so I'll leave you with yet another quote:
We'll get there when we get there
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