Behold the kitchen!

Behold the kitchen! We will install the downdraft stove tomorrow (in that big white spot where I didn't bother painting) and all of the plumbing should be connected by Sat. We plan on building our own concrete countertops, so we'll start that project in the next few weeks. Until then, we make some temporary plywood tops.

We'll also need to repair this:

We got a little too "custom" and after the drywall finisher was done, the fridge didn't fit into it's built in.

My favorite part of the kitchen!

It almost feels like home

A huge weekend, with more pictures to come! We finished up the pine tongue and groove ceiling so we could move the staging out of the living room, and then finished up all of the heart pine flooring. Somehow, we managed to avoid hitting any any of the radiant floor pipes. We now have signs posted in the house instructing all subs to NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES drill into the floor. Because don't you just know that after we managed to install the entire floor without hitting any tubing that something like that would happen!! We also managed to get the living room painted just before the flooring went down, so that I was able to take advantage of the staging before we broke it all down.

One of the homeowners Matt helped build a house for (check it out at www.kengaylord.com, just go to projects and click on Onnick/Farash Residence) dropped by on Sat. to lend his own very skilled hand to our house. We are hoping that he is going to design/build the gable end detail to our house, as he has an artistic sensibility that very much appeals to us. He even stuck around to help Matty move the new kitchen cabinets into place! Thanks Paul!!

Without all the staging and power tools laying around, it really started to feel more like our house. We got so excited that by Sunday afternoon we were moving all of the new appliances in to see everything in place. The idea was I would get a couple of pictures, and then we would pull everything back out so that the electricians could get in and out to connect all of the outlets, etc. We were really worried about the washer and dryer fitting in as we had originally envisioned a stackable in the space, but had found that the combo theoretically would just fit in side by side. Well, they went in with no problem. Unfortunately, the problem was with the fridge. I had given Matty exact measurements of the fridge and he had built a a space for it to slide into with allowances for drywall mud, etc. But our finisher used A LOT of mud. So after several failed attempts (several as in 9 or 10) to get the fridge into the space, we ended up ripping off the drywall bead and sanding the sides down to create just enough to get the fridge in with a good bit of coaxing. Somehow, during this process, it never occurred to me to grab the camera, so you all will just have to use your imaginations. For the full effect, incorporate a lot of expletives.