Out of Jail

There is nothing I hate more than a prison sink. You know, the little square sink that hangs off the wall in the bathroom and makes it look like you only have the basics and no more. If you can't picture it, it looks like this:

So we had one of these in our old house and replaced it with a nice pedestal sink just before we moved. This lovely green one is in our lower level bathroom and we had planned on doing something about it eventually, but it was really low on the priority list. Well, today a sink and vanity came up on freecycle and we got it! It is just as small, but now we have storage below the sink and it is white which is nice as we'd like to leave some of the 70's green behind. As usual, there a is a little domino effect. I had to pull a few baseboard tiles out in order for the cabinet to sit flush with the wall. Also, you can see the pretty deep purple that the wall behind the sink was painted - can you imagine the entire room covered in purple with these green fixtures??? So now I have to patch, prime, and paint as well as cut some tiles to fit back in the baseboard area, but overall, I think it came out well. Remember, it was FREE! Here is the new sink:

Although I am really getting good at it, plumbing is dirty, dirty work. Especially taking off old plumbers putty and gunk in order to get the supply lines and faucets off. Yuk! We kept our faucet as we liked it better than the one that was on the "new" sink, and changed out the handle on the cabinet to a more modern pewter one. It is a start! Now we need a white toilet and a new light fixture and this bathroom will come to the present day! Maybe some hand towels would be good too... I don't know about any more shopping though.

We did what we think might be our final IKEA run today. I feel like I have said that before though. We returned our last few items and bought a cheap countertop for our upstairs bath - we are a little tired of the very creative but truly hideous recycled closet door counter there. While we were there, I once again looked at the stainless steel kitchen island and went back and forth over whether it would be too much steel or would work out OK in the kitchen. I am leaning towards it, but we decided to measure out the space on the floor and see what it will look like first.

There is much more to get up to speed on, but it will all have to wait! Peanut is vying for my attention, asking for "this' and "this", begging to see a "meow meow" and have me draw a doggie. A fabulous life calls!

Customer Service? Do We Have That?

It has been a heck of a day. Peanut and I met the plumber this morning and went over the plan for the day, then we dashed off to IKEA to order our kitchen cabinets. Since this will be my second IKEA kitchen, I have a clue as to what I am doing, and have already completed and reviewed the plan a million times on the planning tool. SO we get there and I upload the plan, print it out and I think "great - we should be out of here in no time!". Ahhhh, no. We got the brand new kitchen associate who took TWO HOURS to review and verify that all the parts were there and the doors were the right finish and the toe kicks were all there.... And then, we bought everything and went to set up delivery, when we discovered that the wine rack in our plan has been discontinued and it is out of stock! Well, if the wine rack goes that screws up my wall cabinet plan, so now I have to replace it with another cabinet. The act of "returning" the wine rack and replacing it with a cabinet and adding it to the current delivery order rather than me going to self serve for part of it and having the cabinet door sent UPS (!?) takes no less than five people and another 2 hours.

Meanwhile, my tiny one has been cooped up in her ERGO all day and is just itching to move. We finally get out of there and head back to the house. In my perfect world, our day included time to go home and have lunch and maybe spin around the playground. Since it is now 2:30pm, and I have not eaten and Peanut only had a little fruit and granola bar at IKEA, we must stop and grab a bite on the way to meet the contractor at 3pm. OK, it is the most horrific idea, but we stop at Burger King of all places! So I'm driving down the road and handing fries and bits of chicken over the back seat to my little one who hasn't the foggiest idea about fast food, but is saying "MMMM" every time I ask if she wants another. Oh yes, she loved it to my dismay. Of course, we arrived at the house, talked with the plumber (and paid him!), met up with my Honey, and got the tiles figured out with the contractor before I could finally sit down and wolf that whopper down. It is 9:30 and I am still feeling that mistake.

We are looking forward to a long weekend of work and hoping to get much done. On tap for tomorrow: prime all of the bedrooms, prep the floors downstairs for the cork, and finish taking the soffitts and wall down in the kitchen. We've also got a few more lights to install, and our contractor will hopefully be done tiling the bathroom floor and will be putting the wall up between the office and the utility room. We hope to finish all of the painting this week, lay the flooring next weekend, and start having the wiring and plumbing in the kitchen done while we build our cabinets which should arrive by the end of next week. We've got three more weekends before we move in!