The Adding On Update

Since my last house addition update, 

we got kitchen cabinets.

So many boxes.

Laying them all out.

Nigel helping.

We had open, floating shelves built instead of installing upper cabinets.

I’ve always had open shelves,

even in our first house in Atlanta.

It saves you money,

 makes unloading the dishwasher a snap

and it makes guests feel comfortable
grabbing a glass for water
or a plate for a meal.

Because they are all right there out in the open.

And when your husband brings home those huge ugly plastic cups
from his gas station ice tea,
you just throw them
in one of the lower cabinets.

Or you throw them in the trash can
and tell him it melted in the dishwasher.

I made our builder, Paul, nervous when I asked him if he was POSITIVE the fridge would fit into its new cabinet home.

That would not even be funny if the fridge that started 

this whole project still didn’t fit into the kitchen.

Lots of measuring later, 

yes, he is POSITIVE it will fit.

Whew!

Our fridge’s future new home.

I can’t even express the excitement I have about this pantry!

They reconfigured the shelves and widened the doorway.

To the right of the shelves, I have an area to hang my broom, mop, Swiffer and aprons.

Yay!!

In our original plan, we were going to keep the brick archway that enclosed the stove area and also hid the ventilation hood.

I can’t believe I wanted to keep it.

Since Julie opened our eyes to the concept of getting rid of it,
(thank you, thank you, thank you, that you did, Julie!!)

we had to come up with a plan to cover the ventilation pipe. 

I did not want one of those stainless steel exposed hoods. 

And not just because they were super expensive.

I looked at pictures on Houzz and Pinterest and printed out a few and gave them to our crew.

They really ran with it and even helped me find the wooden corbels on eBay.

Monte negotiated hard and saved  a

whopping $4.00 on the corbels,

which he still considers a victory.

It turned out awesome!!

 Next, everything got a coat of primer.

Our counters were installed.

When I went to the fabricators to pick out what pieces to put where, they avoided every vein in the stone.

The veining was my favorite part and I had them 

make sure to include every last bit of it!

Some places call this granite, River White, others call it Typhoon White.

We wanted something that looked like marble without the fuss and staining issues of marble.

A one bowl sink! I really couldn’t decide if I wanted to go to stainless steel or stick with the porcelain cast iron I’ve always had.

In the end, I decided stainless steel might hold up better. My white sink was really showing some wear and tear.

While all the above was happening in the kitchen,

our fireplace and cabinets were shaping up in the family room.

The over 100-year-old barn beam mantle my Dad brought from Indiana.
The walls above the cabinets are painted black because one of the workers, Jeremy, suggested putting barn wood behind the open shelves. The black paint would make any cracks in the wood less noticeable.

 Jeremy wrapped the column in the kitchen with barn wood too.

I used to not like this ill-placed column.

Now it’s one of my favorite things in the room.

I really like how it looks with a toilet in front of it.

The barn wood in place.

The red pieces of wood clashed with the stone in the fireplace, 

so Paul brought me a wire brush so I could rub some of the paint off.

I sneezed red dust for two days.

Next came picking a paint color.

At this point, I was in what Monte later diagnosed as 

full-on Decision Paralysis. 

I could not pick a color.

I handed the paint fan that Sumita loaned me to the painter and told him to pick.

I gave him some parameters and he gave me choices and we narrowed things down pretty quick.

We went with Repose Grey by Sherwin Williams.

I like how sometimes it looks beige and sometimes it looks grey.

Next came the tile backsplash.

I decided on a simple white subway tile. 

I made sure the guys saved as many of my decorative tiles as possible 

from the old kitchen so they could be reused. 

That required some work on my part to get all the adhesive and old grout off. 

More on that later.

I decided on a dark grout called Winter Grey.

Yesterday, our kitchen lights were installed.

I bought those cool Edison light bulbs for the pendants and over the sink light we found on sale online at Pottery Barn around the holidays.

And our cabinet hardware was installed!!!

Oil rubbed bronze handles and knobs.

Have you fallen asleep yet? 

I feel like I’ve just shown you our vacation pictures from out West and it bored you into slumber!

That actually happened to us. 

Our neighbor nodded off during our slideshow.

We still like to bring it up at neighborhood parties.