Forward Motion and Tangible Progress

What a difference a day makes! On Friday, our kitchen looked something like this only with a better floor:

By the end of the day on Saturday, it looked like this:

Thanks to the tremendous help of Russ and the errand-running of Dad A., the kitchen really came together in quick order. We are so pleased with the cabinets! The cushion close glides are wonderful and the finish is beautiful. (For some reason, the corner cabinet has some discoloration in these photos, but in real life, it is flawless.)

Of course, it wouldn't be a home improvement project if something didn't go wrong--that seems to be our theme for this project. This time, the snag came when we realized that the sink cabinet would not be centered over the window opening. Apparently, someone's measurements were off by about 6 inches. Yikes! What to do? Just about the time we were ready to mount the off-set kitchen sink cabinet, Bill realized that we could switch out one of the narrower drawer cabinets intended for the island with a wider cabinet next to the oven cabinet. The end result: a slightly larger island, and a sink that is now centered over the window. The added bonus is that there is now a six-inch gap next to the sink cabinet--perfect for a wine rack, which I wanted in the first place but didn't have room for. (The short version: We has a slight snafu. Yada, yada, yada. Now we have a larger island and a wine rack.)

Then, on Sunday, Bill finished the living room floor, so now, not only do we have a kitchen that almost looks like a kitchen, we also have a functional living room. While I'll certainly miss the huge blue plastic tarp that covered our living room furniture and the lovely glow it cast across the room when the sun hit it just right, it is nice to have a room where I can sit and read to Andrew every night.

Of course, there is still a lot to do to finish this project: add the crown molding, trim the floor and the doorways, hook up the dishwasher, order and install a countertop. Now, some of you may be wondering how we've survived this long without a kitchen sink. That's easy. In the interest of saving our precious natural resources like water, we've improvised. Thanks, Andrew, for doing the dishes!