Welcome to our home! In my last (and first) Work til Jesus Comes Wednesday post, I showed a few pictures of our house before we started working on it. You can see those
here.
The first few projects we did focused on getting the basement livable and the kitchen usable. First priority was the central heating & air unit. I tend to be hot-natured so AC was important the summer was coming up fast down in the Sultry South. Normally, this isn’t a DIY project so it would just be picking the company and waiting on them to install it. My hubs knew a certified company that would allow him to do part of the work, thus reducing our cost! Such a smart man!
It was during this time, we removed the old gas furnace from the floor of the hallway.
Since, it almost gave me a concussion on more than one occasion (one time it was not good, I just sat in the floor for awhile), I happily took my birthday present to it! Let me introduce you to Demi, one of my birthday presents last year.
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| This isn't actually my sledgehammer but looks just like it did when it was new. |
I am happy to report the furnace now resides in a junk yard north-east of Athens where we sell our junk metal. J
The kitchen was next on the list. Hey, we both love our food and prefer to eat at home.
My MIL found BINS and we used it to paint the inside of the cabinets to control the stains and smell. It worked great!! If you have any area that needs the super primer approach, then you should, most assuredly check out BINS!
I will take this opportunity to explain the smell and stains because in some places the stains still haunt us. We have been told they are from cigarettes and the tar contained in the cigarettes. In some rooms we have primer and two coats of paint and I can still pick out the stains. Most people wouldn’t notice but I do. Later we will have to repaint some rooms. The kitchen of course had the added bonus of the stovetop and all the fun smoky things that come with it. J
Well, once we painted the cabinets, we needed a countertop surface that would hold up for a little while. Once we get the “new” kitchen area up and going we are going to tile the countertops with a 12” porcelain tile which you will get to see in the future!!
We decided to use the plywood we would be using for the tile as our temporary countertops after we checked the price of even cheap Formica ones. I used an exterior paint to help with stains and water and then screwed them down. We installed the stainless sink we scored for $50 at a discount building place on our honeymoon. Oh yes, on our honeymoon! LOL
The sink was actually an undermount with clips around the sides that are used to install it. This is where my other birthday present came in handy – my Dremel! I told you I have an awesome hubby!!
I used the dremel with a metal blade to cut off the clips and then it started it’s new life as a drop-in.
After we got our “countertop” ready, I lined the cabinets and went to unpacking the kitchen stuff. Let me tell you, this is where I realized (and this is not the first time) that I have too much stuff! So this is what the kitchen looked like after all this work.
Downstairs in the basement, we had two rooms and a hallway to deal with on the floor issues. The bank had said they had reached the end of their useful life. And next week we will go down to the basement and see what we can get in to!!
Don't forget to come back Thursday night to see my first giveaway!!! Get your tastebuds ready!!
