Continuing on from where we left off a few days ago in Part 1, we were in the middle of building a wall in the kitchen to split it into two rooms. Two days later, the wall was nearly finished which meant it was nearly time to start finishing out the ceiling and walls.


We were also starting to get a feeling of what it would be like looking out from inside the kitchen and we liked what we saw although we were still a bit freaked out at times. ๐Ÿ™‚

The overall view from the courtyard was also looking pretty good…the green door on the left was the original door into the workshop – now our door into the mudroom which then connects to the kitchen.

Now this was the hole that scared us the most, breaking through the wall of the main house into the workshop. Before they started the hole, we almost backed out…and then once it was started we still wondered if we’d done the right thing. But now that it’s all finished, we are SO happy that we did break through and build the kitchen out. The house just wouldn’t be the same without it and we really love the new kitchen.

The view from inside the house…and unfortunately our windows hadn’t arrived yet so it was very cold in the house since it was nearly the middle of December.

30 hours later, we had a ceiling. We originally wanted to try to keep the curves exposed (or even take the plaster off and just leave the bricks which are under there in the open) but it was determined that it was possible that the bricks may not look as good as we wanted, could start to crumble if we tried to take the plaster off and could just cause trouble in general. Since we didn’t want half of the house falling down, we just went for a new drywall ceiling.

A weekend passed and my next day back in the house I found drywall on the walls and the seems had been floated. All the electrical wiring had been run around the room and along the floor (for the island), the water pipes had also been run everywhere in the room and raditors were stubbed out. Woohoo. They had also framed out the steps leading from the main house into the workshop…which means a load of screet was on its way!

It didn’t take them all that long to get the floor insulated and poured and then we had to wait. Our windows still hadn’t arrived and we couldn’t go any further inside while the concrete was wet.

But then, finally, our windows were here which meant we could finally turn the heat up again in the house and hopefully let it start warming up. We had hoped to be moving into the house by Christmas…or at least wanted to celebrate Christmas in the house, cooking in our new kitchen and everything. As you can see here, the door we ultimately ordered (which is still huge) was considerably smaller than what the architect suggested so they had to fill up several square feet of wall. If we had gone with the architect’s plans, we wouldn’t have been able to get the door open regardless of which direction the doors opened. To the inside they’d hit the stairs and outside the pump, not to mention you’d need to step on the pump cover to walk out which just isn’t practical.

During all this, our contractor installed a new waste water system which meant digging up the pavers in the courtyard – not a fun job. But the jack hammer man who broke his ankle a month before was finally back on the job doing menial tasks.

Things progressed rather quickly after that (aside from our contractors vacation over Christmas – nope, we didn’t make it into the house).

The walls and ceiling were all painted once the windows and door were finally in…

…and we were quite pleased with the results – especially since it wasn’t quite so arctic feeling anymore.

Then came the tile. Oh so exciting. Half of the floor was finished before the holidays but there was no grout. Unfortunately we didn’t know we could have started our kitchen and left it standing around while he grouted around the cabinets…so instead we waited until the entire floor was finished before beginning that “fun” project.

If you ever buy yourself a kitchen from IKEA and think you will save yourself some money and put it together yourself – DON’T! We actually were trying to save ourselves some time because they were supposed to deliver our kitchen in the middle of December and then it turned into January so we took matters into our own hands and went to get everything to assemble the kitchen ourselves – also not a smart or easy task…but we did finally get it all together (this photo was taken during one of our moving days).

A few months after we moved in we finally got our granite counter tops from Italy

And last month our side-by-side which wasn’t quite planned but we absolutely adore arrived which makes our kitchen nearly complete. We still need to put the kick-plate blinders along the floor and the handles on the island cabinets facing us…but it’s a fully functional kitchen now which we really, really love. At least 4 people can prepare food at once in there and 15 people can easily mill around while collecting food and chatting…which makes it just perfect for parties which almost always end up in the kitchen ๐Ÿ™‚