Paulette

We are getting the floors done this week prior to getting the new kitchen cupboards.  This means all and I really mean all has to be removed from the kitchen & living room.

Luckily we don’t have much furniture so that wasn’t a huge problem.  I had been packing some seldom used kitchen dishes so that brought the work down a little.

Emptying the refrigerator and moving it and the stove were the major events.  Brian helped his Dad move the heavy stuff using carrying straps.  They do work very well (both the guys and the straps!).

Mindy helped a lot by packing the food and moving small items to the garage.

Kat & Hong joined in and helped as well.

Good thing the kids helped.  With all the hands in there we still weren’t finished until 11:00 PM.

Dave finished the floor grills today.  What a job that was.  Cutting into 50 year old floor is not an easy job.  The wood has hardened like cement it seems.

There’s still some work to do before the cabinets arrive in July.  A closet needs to be constructed, some wiring moved.  I also need to buy a new sink and taps so that we have them when the contractor needs to make a template for the counter top.

Good work Dave!

We are tying up loose ends with the new floors. We have a small section of new untreated wood. We need to keep it clean, especially from oils, until we get it refinished.

We took the vinyl flooring from the kitchen and cut strips to fit over the area. Pretty sexy looking, eh?

We removed the hardwood at the front entrance. It will be replaced eventually with ceramic tiles - something a little more suited to our winters.

Until then we installed some plywood and more of the vinyl flooring. It’s amazing how many different applications we managed with one small piece of vinyl.

Dave wired the dishwasher so we no longer have to wash by hand. Yeah!

He added the plug back to the island.

It feels like we are back to normal. As normal as this dysfunctional kitchen can be with it’s 4 different counter tops, drawers that won’t close, etc.

Dave has to work but I have the day off. I was hoping to get more done but I’m just not as good as Dave.

We almost manage to get the floor finished today. There’s just one section under the cupboards to do. We used some of the new flooring that we bought. What a joy to work with clean wood after sorting through old broken & dirty pieces looking for the right fit.

I liked putting the floor down especially when we used the new wood. I could do that part again. I don’t ever want to rip up old hardwood though. Leave that to the pros!

The fun just continues. The day was spent removing another section. It proved to be a bit more challenging. Some of the boards were glued down. Some had extra nails.

By now the kitchen is half functional. We are realizing we won’t get this all done on the weekend. We got one of the 3 heat grills installed. It is perfect. Dave is very good at this!

We finished the other cold-air return grill too. You can see the patch that had been glued down.

If it wasn’t for all the time spent removing the old floor we would have been done already. Next time we do old floors, wait, there won’t be a next time!

Much of the day was spent removing floor boards and preparing the cold air returns for the new wooden grills.

We needed to remove more pieces to feather in the flooring. The wood was cut blunt at the walls that once stood there.

The grills were custom ordered but did not come the size we expected. It all worked out but it’s a good thing we didn’t install the flooring before we received the grills.

By 11:00 PM we called it quits even though Kat was willing to put up with the noise of the compressor, air nailer and shop-vac until later.

We got a decent amount of flooring installed in the evening given that we are using old floor boards that require cleaning. Also not one board is the same length as any other. I don’t know how they installed floors in the 50’s but it sure makes it a challenge trying to match it up today to our custom job.

The grill is perfect. It ends up flush with the floor. It is the same wood as the floors just unfinished. It’ll all look good once we get the floors sanded and refinished.

What better way to spend a Friday night than prepping for flooring.  It was quite a job to take out the cabinets, sink & dishwasher (again).  First Dave had to find the screws (that I painted over) so he could clean out the heads to remove them.

The flooring is 50+ years old.  Look at that checkerboard pattern - was that really in style at some point?

Where does it all go when you move it out of the way?

Here’s the first section cleaned out.  That’s it for tonight.  What a mess and it’s only just beginning!

 thermostat that is.  The old one took a beating during our last renovation.  The workmen couldn’t figure out how to remove it from the wall so they forced it.   Of course that caused it to break a little.  It was also a weird colour.  I never liked it.

“When are you installing the new thermostat? ”

“I’m doing it tonight.  It won’t take but a few minutes. ”

Seems I’ve heard statements like that before and that usually means a few hours with at least one trip to Home Depot.

It really did take just a few minutes.  It took longer for him to read the instructions to know how to program it.  It’s much cleaner looking.

“Um,  it won’t match the appliances.  Does it come in stainless steel? ”

“No I’m sure it doesn’t.”

Well maybe it doesn’t, yet.

We’ve been side-tracked the last week or so from our kitchen renovations. Our in-floor heating conked out (see Feb 1 2008).

Dave decided to do it himself with expert help from my Dad. It wasn’t in the plan. We were supposed to be doing the kitchen floor so that we can move forward with new appliances etc.

The in-floor system isn’t our only source of heat but the house is calibrated assuming that it does function. Our bedroom is one of the rooms that enjoys the warmth of heated floors. The past couple of weeks have been chilly. We still get some heat but not to the level that I like.

I have to admit the last day or so I’ve been grumpy about the cold floors. Finally today it appears to be done. I won’t get to enjoy it until tomorrow night though. We are on our way to Tremblant.

Today is a good day. The heat is on. The Sens play the Habs. Alfie & Heater are both back playing. Go Sens Go. The heat is on.