Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Snow Day

0 comments
After the warmest and driest CO winter ever, its now snowing nearly every other day. I think the explanation for this is El Nino, or some other crazy Spanish weather phenomenon.



Thursday, March 26, 2009

Look What's Finished

0 comments
Yeah, not the whole project.. sorry if I got your hopes up! Instead, its only our incredibly complicated two-sided-entry no-visible-screw-holes peninsula, complete with two fake doors. Next up: Wall cabinets and the challenges that come along with crown molding, under cabinet lighting, etc etc etc...


Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Time Travel

1 comments
We got a touch of demolition fever last night. Hope you enjoy this journey through the history of linoleum:

1. Current kitchen floor ~ late nineties

2. One layer down ~ late eighties

3. Two layers down ~ late seventies

4. Three layers down ~ 1971, baby! Under this is only subfloor... we think...

Who needs slate? That yummy green goodness looks like its in mint condition.

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Visitors

0 comments
Not much work going on this month. We had a great visit with old friends last week and are looking forward to 6 more visitors on Wednesday.

Monday, March 2, 2009

Countertop options

0 comments
Well, face-frames are all stained and finished. By the end of it, we worked out a simple semi-fool-proof method. Also all but the peninsula are actually even assembled. And the peninsula will be first on the list once August gets back from training. Next on the list is to make some of the uppers.. I forsee this going quickly as these are smaller than the base cabinets and there's only four of them.. for now.. A few more later...

In the meantime, we've been investigating countertop options. Originally we had this idea to do concrete, and pour them ourselves. However, that was before we decide to also make the cabinets. Now I think we have enough "homemade" for one kitchen.

Thus, I got a couple of quotes on granite. We have a whooping 27 square feet of countertop (quite small) but 23 linear feet of exposed edges. In the granite world, exposed edges = $$$. The quotes came in at $2100 and $1900. That's $70 / sq ft. Also, granite is HEAVY. What if our cabinets buckle under the pressure? More likely, what if the floor buckles instead? I'm kidding... sort of...

So we considered granite tile. Excellent idea... The tiles are in the $10/sq ft range. We can install them ourselves. Besides, its not like we live in an upscale neighborhood or anything. However, we have SO MUCH exposed edging. And with tile you have a few options:
  • do the edging in wood - eh... maybe a little dated... Kinda reminds me of the 80s. (See image on left.)
  • ease and polish the sharp edges on the edge tiles - can have a fabricator do this for $10-12 /linear foot. Or get a grinder and DIY... (See image on right, ignore tape.







As an alternative option, we are heavily considering going with a compromise: Some companies sell tile with bullnose edges built right in. Its still tile, so we can install it ourselves. The edges will look much nicer. Of course there's a cost associated with that.. We are looking at ~$27/sq ft. Still a little high, but at least we don't have many of those square feet to cover. Here are some images so you can see what I'm talking about.