Sink Me!

It's taken several days, a few trips to the hardware store, and a lot of swearing, but we have a sink!

We've had almost six days of washing dishes in the bathroom.  Not only that--I never realized how many times a day I give my hands (or a spoon, or whatever) a quick rinse.

I've really tried not to complain and to be mindful of gratitude, because Bob and I have both lived in places where people had to walk to a fountain with jugs to get water.  I just had to walk an extra 13 steps a few dozen times a day to get all the fresh running water I want.   But even that got old after awhile.

It's far from over.  There's still all that . . . stuff . . . in the living room to be sorted and put away.  And the cabinets need to be painted.    But today--we celebrate (meaning we had a beer at lunch and now I may not get anything done this afternoon)

Saturday: Interlude

Saturday I get to take a break from the kitchen because I was scheduled to teach a felting class at the local yarn store.  Bob met friends for lunch and then made the next trip to Home Depot *and* Lowes to get a selection of plumbing part.

The class was fun--we were making felt scarves.  It's pretty simple--lay out wisps of colored wool, get it wet and a bit soapy, roll it up in bubble wrap and rock it for awhile until it turns into felt.  Pretty instant gratification compared to the hours and hours it takes to knit or weave.

 

As the saying goes--a good time was had by all.  My students told the shop owner that this class should be offered on a regular basis so I would call that a success.

This afternoon we pulled the sink out and Bob turned the faucet around, replaced the drain, and sealed it with a new tube of caulking.  Hopefully that will set up and we try installing tomorrow.

Bit by bit things are moving back into the kitchen--but I'm being very firm about what makes the cut.  I started to do a bit more purging after the sink removal but decided that I needed to finish catching up with the blog instead.  I believe that's referred to as "creative work avoidance."

Friday: The Saga of the Sink

We did have one major splurge on this update.  As long as we were saving money by doing our own destruction, we went for a hammered copper sink.  We ordered an undermount one, because that would eliminate the little edge that gunk gets caught under.  Then we found out that in order to use an undermount you have to have a solid counter, not a laminate one.  So we had to return that sink and get a drop in.

That should have clued us that the sink was not going to be cooperative.

So . . . back to Tuesday.  The new counter is in, the mess has been cleaned up, and Bob starts to put together the new sink.  One of the things you have to do is "insert the enclosed clamps."  There are no enclosed clamps.  So off to the Home Depot (all projects are gauged by how many trips to the hardware store you make) to buy clamps.  Got home--and they were too big.  That was another Wednesday errand--returning the clamps.  Contact the company and they pop the set of clamps into UPS.

So on Thursday (expecting the clamps on Friday) Bob preps the sink by installing the faucet and drains, caulking in the latter.  Friday morning--the caulk is still just as wet and gooey as the day before.  Not setting at all.  Bob scrapes it off and uses plumber putty instead.  It's ready to go by the time UPS delivers the clamps.  Clamps are installed and we drop in the sink and crawl under the cabinet to tighten things down.

The new sink is bigger than our old one, and there was very little leeway between the sink and the cabinet wall on one side.  I got to tighten those because I have smaller hands.  More awkward posturing under a cabinet.

Finally the great moment arrives--after 5 days, we will have a kitchen sink and no longer need to wash dishes in the bathroom!  I reach to turn on a tap (we actually found a faucet set with hot and cold taps).  "Bob,"  I say.  "This is weird.  The faucets turn back instead of forward."  A bit of swearing ensues as he realizes that he had the sink upside-down when he installed the faucet so it's backwards.  That gets put on the "deal with it later" list.  So water is turned on . . . and the leak is found.  He tightens and wraps that seal--and something else jiggers loose and leaks.  Fittings don't fit.  He's cutting bits off PVC pipe.  Finally he tightens the last fitting--and the plumbers putty gives way and the sink drain pops loose.

We have alcohol and give it up for the night.

Wednesday: We Rest. Thursday: I Paint

Sort of rested on Wednesday.  I had a morning off-grounds program for the Museum, which by the time you go there, load up animals and program materials in the car, drive to the program, do it, reload, return, put animals back in cages, wash carriers  and put program materials away takes about a half day.  And we ran some errands.  So about the only kitchen work that got done on Wednesday was that I purged and returned three drawers.

Thursday was a painting day.  As long as I had the cabinets empty, I thought I would paint the insides of the cabinets, changing the light-sucking drab brown into gloss white.  It doesn't sound like that big of a deal, but it does mean being down on the knees in some pretty awkward positions so I needed frequent breaks.  And they all needed two coats.  But it makes quite the difference!

 

There will be more painting--a lot more.  I really like my bright orange cabinets, but I knew they would not go with the copper oxide counters.  And they need repainting anyway.  Rob was wondering why we just didn't splurge and get new cabinets but 1) that would be another pain in the backside, and 2) I'm used to having vivid cabinets and plain wood of any type wouldn't do it for me.

 

Of course, the decision has to be made about the color.  One of Wednesday errands was going to Home Depot for that gloss white paint, and while I was there I grabbed a lot of paint color chips and tossed them on the counter.

 

 

There were eventually many more, and I cut up the multi-color strips so I could view them individually.  I'd play with them as I walked by, and pulled out the obvious losers, and realized that what I was hunting for was the green verdigris that copper gets as it ages.  There was a long of angsting (that looks weird--how does one angst?).  It got down to a few strips of a lot of "I want it bluer than this, but greener than that".  The winner turned out to be--wait for it--a color called "green meets blue".  Bob's picking up a sample can today.

Day Two: Tuesday

Tuesday morning we finished pulling off the old counters and yanked out the sink.

Then I had some serious cleaning to do.  I don't think ever the most Martha Stewart type every take off their countertops to clean under them.  At one point I felt a little cut on my thumb and assumed that I had scraped a staple or something--but then my thumb turned the most interesting shade of purple so I suspect that one of the various spiders I was evicting took her revenge on me (no--I didn't go to the doctor--it didn't look like a black widow or brown recluse bite and the purple eventually stopped spreading).

Then we pulled out the stove.  In today's parlance:  OMG!!  Shall we say a bit more cleaning . . .

Finally--cleaned and ready.

Then, in the afternoon, just as it started pouring down rain, the installer arrived.  No worries--they set up shop on our front porch, and sure enough, in about an hour we had out new counters.  Copper oxide pattern (beautiful and won't show stains)

I did have a bit of a comeuppance.  After all, I had been rather proud of myself for being able to squeeze into that 8.5" opening to get to the back corner.  As I was wondering if I was going to have to offer my services again for the installation, the 6'7" assistant popped into it like a bunny going down a burrow.  Ahem.  The 6'7" *lanky* assistant.  And young.  It was pretty hysterical.

So the new counters are in.  And beautiful.  But we're not quite done . . . .

Day One (Monday, July 11)

So Bob and I are in the kitchen dealing with the gifts of the garden--making several batches of pesto to freeze and some habanero jelly.  In the middle of this pleasant domestic chaos we get a phone call from the installer--our countertops have arrived and he could install them tomorrow.

We weren't exactly ready--but we bit the bullet and said yes (as Lady Macbeth said--"if 'tis down when 'tis done, 'twere best 'twere done quickly").

Goodbye, old counters.

 

(actually it never does look quite this nice--we had already cleaned all the stuff off the counters.)  At this distance it doesn't look that bad--but here's the closeup.

 It wasn't a matter of just waiting for the next day.  Frugal beings that we are, we had elected to take off the old counter ourselves.  But first--and this is a big but--we had to empty out the cabinets.  All of them.  Even the "zombie" cabinets--those corner ones that have unreachable depths and where you shove everything that you don't use but for some reason keep anyway.  And the drawers had to be pulled out.

So now my living room looks like this.

 

Trust me--that's not all going back in.  There's going to be some serious purging.

 

*Then* we could start removing the countertops.  The challenge was to get to the screws in the far back corners.  Remember those "zombie" cabinets?  They are about 3 feet deep--but the cabinet door is only 8.5 inches wide.  Neither of us have arms that are three feet long--so I had to get into the cabinet.  Um--I'm a little more that 8.5 inches wide.  It took quite a bit of wiggling and rearranging of the squishy bits but I managed. 

 

 

 

And then I had to be able to work upside down--but I got all the screws out.

 

We slept well that night.

 

 

 

 

The Great Kitchen Update

The kitchen is getting a facelift.  No--not a full "tear out and redo."  I'd just buy another house before I'd live in a full kitchen renovation.  But ours definitely needs a facelift.

When we first moved in (25 years ago!!) it was a drab brown kitchen.  Rough brown wood walls (think exterior siding--what was the builder thinking?), drab brown cabinets, and yellow Formica countertops.  I really disliked the walls--not only were they drab brown, but the rough surface caught every bit of dust and spiderweb.  But I really couldn't stand the idea of taking all the cabinets down, prying off that siding, putting up drywall . . . you get the idea.

Then I made the mistake of watching one of those DIY shows where they make over a house in 24 hours--and they just used joint compound to cover the ugly wall.  Eureka!

It ended up taking a bit more than 24 hours.  And 12 gallons of drywall compound.  And moving the fridge and the washer and dryer to the middle of the room.  But I do like the results.

A few years later we pulled up the torn and stained linoleum floor and tiled it.  That also was . . . a bit of work.

The yellow Formica was the next to go--or at least disappear.  At the time we couldn't afford the $500 or so to replace it, so I painted and polyurethaned it a tomato-leaf green.  Then I painted the cabinets a bright orange (they were supposed to be tomato-colored).  At that point I declared it done and was happy for about 10 years.

But over that decade the counters got stained, and chipped, and some of the paint peeled.  I thought about repainting (and you can get paint meant for counters now) but as the saying goes "you can't polish a turd."  We really needed new counters.  And I had already picked out the one I wanted a few years ago (yes, I procrastinate).  What's the big deal--you actually hire a professional to do it, and it's a one-day job.

Yeah, right.  Stay tuned.