kitchen and bath remodel!

     Scroll down to the bottom to just see the before and after pictures or read here to get the story behind it all.

     Duane had Tristen (3 1/2 years) and William (11months) in Arizona for Dec. 6-14 for a follow up job interview and to visit family (yep, Duane's a trooper with the little kiddos!). During this time we kind of switched roles since I was at home in Albany working on house projects like installing kitchen cabinets, painting rooms, fixing tile in the bathroom, all in preparation to sell our house in early spring. For weeks leading to this time, I planned and prepared to work on these various projects around the house.

I took off all the cupboards (upper and lower) and boiled the thickly painted hinges with baking soda for 30 minutes to clean the old paint off, then I repainted them to a dark brown.

After:

I also roughly sanded the cabinets, repainted them to match the white trim in the house, put a brown glaze around the frame and put back up the upper cabinets with the fresh looking hinges. I also took off the glass knobs and cleaned the paint from the screws as well and painted the screws to the dark brown (all to match the dark brown lower cabinets that would be coming). 

The valance that connects the two upper cabinets also got a glazed decorative piece.

 

 After repainting the upper cabinets, hinges, and knobs:

(I still need to put in the trim around the window. You can see the insulation there in the middle)

 Lower cabinets before we took them out:

(yeah, they were getting pretty bad... the yellow is where the paint had scraped away and you can see at the bottom where the wood was rotting away very badly)

 
Also in preparation I prayed to have the necessary strength to work hard throughout the day and use my time as wisely as possible to get as much done as possible. I felt that as long as I was making good choices of what to eat, and reading my scriptures daily, I would be blessed with the energy I needed.
     After I dropped Kalvin off at school, the morning of the 6th I had Duane working very hard till the time he left for the airport just a couple hours later. He only had 2 hours of sleep the night before at the hospital so I felt bad asking him to do so much, but for my own projects to get done, I needed his help this morning disconnecting all the plumbing from the sink (I had already taken the old cabinet faces off).
Here's a picture of the plumbing coming up to our faucet! Seriously, how did we have any water pressure with only a few pin holes for water to pass through?!

We were then officially without water supply or drainage in the kitchen!

     I dropped Duane and the boys off at the airport 1 hour before their flight and thank goodness for the thoughtful security man because Duane would have missed the flight had he not been able to cut in line.
      From the moment I dropped off Duane, Tristen and William off at the airport, I felt every minute was important and should be well spent. I got to work right away with purchasing various needed supplies. From sun up to way after sun down, I worked hard every day working on things not only in our house, but I was also able to do my visiting teaching, help with the Branch Christmas party, enjoy a few date nights with Kalvin, plan primary Sunday lessons, and give rides to and attend the scout pack meeting.

Kal eating a lemon at the restaurant (it's kind of a tradition for him).

 And he ALWAYS gets mac n' cheese.

 I enjoyed some yummy potatoes, chicken and shrimp!

 And for dessert, Kalvin got mud pie with the worms included! He had a great time with that.

 We also got to go ice skating (Kalvin's first time ever!)

 Lots of these (smiles):

 and this (hanging on to the side)

 

And of course this too:

       Thank goodness from my friend, Theda, who made herself available to help me with a lot of the projects I was trying to tackle on my own. We joked that with the little bit of knowledge and experience I had with working with house projects in the past (and from watching Duane work) and her experience with watching This Old House, we could probably get some things done. We were able to figure some things out, but I did find that I had to call on Elder Walker, the senior missionary in our Branch, to help out a number of times. Elder Walker has built and helped to build at least 8 home in his lifetime (5 of which were his own).
      Duane and the boys left on Wednesday and by Saturday morning (after Kalvin and I had some good quality time together a few nights in a row) I was ready to get the kitchen sink and cabinets out of the kitchen since our cabinets were scheduled to come Monday night. I asked a few men in the church to come help me move the 50" cast iron sink from the kitchen. It took some figuring out, but they were able to get it out, but not without a good sweat.

After that Kalvin and I worked to get the rest of the cabinetry out of the kitchen. We worked till early afternoon and I finished with the big shopvac.

This is a nasty picture. The black on that slab of wood was in between the sink and the cabinet it was sitting on. Years of food and trash was stuck here.

 Kalvin had a great time hammering away to get these cabinets out. I was surprised at his diligence. He stuck around a couple house working to get his side (the right side) done. He even helped me take all the trash to the front porch afterwards.

 Whoever initially installed the cabinets made sure to get a strong connection to the plaster walls. I swear we tore out at least 100 of these 3 inch long nails! What a pain!

By the time I had finished vacuuming, the kitchen was very dusty so I left for a few minutes.

 As the dust was settling I thought I'd go into the main bathroom to look at the shower. A few of the 4X4 tiles had already fallen and knew that I needed to reattach them and had all the proper supplies I needed (or so I thought).

 As I began to take the tiles off I noticed the plaster wall was mush in some areas and it needed to come out. Well, before I knew it I was not only taking many tiles off the wall, I was ripping the wall off too and exposing just the 2X4 frame. I didn't know where to stop. Several of the tiles had broken during removal and I didn't want to take them all off, but I didn't want to reattach broken tiles either.

This was a low point for me realizing that I had no kitchen and here I had just ripped the walls out of my only working shower. After working in there a few hours it was time for me to get ready for the Branch Christmas party.
     I took a Mexican bath as Duane calls it (using a wash cloth to get clean, since that's how the kids in Mexico were cleaned when he served his two year mission) and got to the party early (I was very ready to get away from the hole I had dug myself into).
     My sister, April, made these nativity costumes for all the married kids last year for Christmas (best idea ever!) so I was able to let the kids use them at the party. They were so darling!

I love how the children (who were unrehearsed) all gathered themselves around the baby Jesus's manger.

At the party I talked to my friend, Theda, and she told me she could come over Monday to help with the projects. Another friend, Carolin, agreed to watch Theda's 2 year old for a few hours during the day. I also asked Elder Walker to stop by Saturday night to assess the situation in the bathroom to help me come up with a plan. He and I came up with a game plan and that night I picked up the essential supplies just before the store closed so that Monday morning I could get to work right away. Saturday night I stayed up till 1AM working to get the rest of the tile out and tearing down the walls that needed to come out and bagging up lots and lots of trash.

 My goal that night was to work and get it all out and cleaned so that I could at least take a bath.

 

 I did just that. It was so wonderful to finally relax in the tub except for the fact that all I could see was work to be done.

       Sunday was a day of rest (and planning). Kalvin and I also went to a friends house for dinner, the Gibbs. It was nice to get out of the house again and enjoy some really great food and good company.
     Monday morning came and I began to work with cleaning up and prep work for building up the walls again. First I had to use the angle grinder with a diamond disk that was strong enough to cut through the cement plaster walls. It was VERY dusty (hence the filter).

Theda came over and we did what we thought was best and Elder Walker came over for the few hours that he had open as well. His help was essential. He cut intricate pieces on the cement board to fit over the knobs (see how much dust the angle grinder produces?).

 He stayed till Theda had to leave as well and I had to pick up Kalvin from school. It was amazing to me to see how much more work it was than I thought. Here the tree of us had worked hard for several hours and what had we accomplished? We put the cement walls up. Not as much as I would have like to accomplish in one day.

 That night my kitchen cabinets were delivered! I was so excited for them. It felt like Christmas! 7 big boxes in our living room!

      That next day, Theda and I were excited to go into the kitchen with the new cabinets, but we decided to start in the bathroom first and then go into the kitchen. Theda was a great help to analyze where to start the tile work in the shower since we had several knobs to work around. We wanted to plan it just right to make sure that the cutting we had to do for the 5 knobs we had to work with, would be at the top or bottom of tiles and not in the center of them. With Theda there we were able to get the first 3 rows of tile done, but then we had to get our kiddos from school.

Well, I picked up Kal from school and I didn't stop my work in the shower. Kalvin made us dinner (fruit smoothies, yum!)

 and I work hard till 3 AM when I got the last tiles up and scraped all the old peeling paint from the walls and ceiling and put drywall mud to smooth it out.

 

 It was kind of tricky getting the cement off my fingers. I hadn't REALLY cleaned them all day. Also, this may be the last time I wear these pants. They were my favorite jeans in high school and I've patched a crotch whole several times, but this day it wripped like 7 inches and there is cement all over. I'm not sure if I'll toss them or keep them so in 20 years I can see the jeans I wore in high school (and could still fit into after 3 kiddos).

 I set my alarm for 8AM and took Kalvin to school. Then I finished the grout just as Theda showed up that morning with her little one. What a great feeling it was to have done so much in the bathroom. It looked so much better now!

     Our plan that Wednesday morning was to tackle the kitchen, but instead we finished up some things in the bathroom and got some of the cabinets into place in the kitchen.
      Kalvin helped to paint the PVC molding that trimmed the tile after he got home from school that day.

       It was early Thursday with Theda that I realized our kitchen plans were less than ideal. The dish drawer (it's a dishwasher that is small enough to be a drawer inside a cabinet) was not working like I thought and was the same width as the entire cabinet! Bad. Bad! Bad!!!
      I hated doing it, but Theda talked me into calling Elder Walker again to ask for help and advise. Luckily he was able to be there within 30 minutes as their schedule was free. He and I and Theda discussed what we could do with the situation. He let me know that he could come over the next morning to help out and told Theda and I to anchor in the corner and two connecting cabinets. I was so grateful for his ideas and that he questioned why I had done certain things (I was already embarrassed for so many things I had done wrong and for starting so many projects), but he moved forward with solutions. After Elder Walker left, Theda and I worked on those 3 cabinets for hours, but could not understand how to put them into place and soon it was time for us both to be done so that we could get our kids from school. It was very frustrating! Basically we had accomplished a single task that day!
      At this point I began to be very discouraged and it was taking a major toll on my energy levels. Kalvin and I were supposed to meet Duane in NYC the next evening. I had hoped to have Friday as a cleanup and do laundry day so that when we all got back the house the following week, at least it wouldn't be a disaster. In the week I'd been home alone with Kalvin, I had not cleaned up once or done a single load of laundry and with no kitchen and barely a bathtub to rinse off in, the house was looking pretty bad.
     I picked up Kalvin from school and talked to Duane on the phone briefly. I really just wanted to explode with frustration. Probably in order to protect himself from any unneeded stress since he couldn't physically help me at that time, Duane simply said, "I don't want to know. Don't tell me." I quickly got off the phone offended and hurt. I had worked so hard for 8 days, sacrificing sleep, entertainment and time with family in Arizona for not a single project to be finished? I was very upset with the situation! Why had I started so many projects? What was I thinking? The bathroom walls still needed to be sanded and painted, all the laundry and packing hadn't even been started, and to top it off my house was a disaster with dust from working littering everything on the main level, dirty dishes piled up on the table and so much more clutter and tools were everywhere. With Duane and I ending on what I thought were uncertain circumstances, I had very little energy left.
     A few minutes later I received a text from an odd number, but before even reading the text I knew it was from Duane because he'd left his cell phone at his sisters house and often he will text me from his tablet when he's at work (his tablet texts come from odd numbers). The text read, "Sending you all my love and strength to get through tonight and tomorrow. May peace be with you. Love always! XXXOOO" Immediately my heart melted and I began to cry. Those are the exact words I needed to hear at the moment, from the person I needed to hear them from. I text back thanking him for the message and he again text "Let others carry you. :) Really wish I could be there, but I know your posse is large and fabulous! :)"
It was as if a surge of energy and enthusiasm over took me and I was extremely motivated to work. His belief in me helped me to believe that I could make it through that hard time and immediately my attitude changed. I came home from getting Kalvin and was able to clean up a lot. That night I worked hard in the bathroom, sanding and painting! I finished as much as I could for now.

 Out of all the projects I had initially planned at least I had come close to finishing one! And I was happy with that because it was a big one!
 I worked to get all the laundry done throughout the night and our packed our suitcases. By 6 AM I had everything done that I could in the bathroom (I had to let the paint cure before putting up the molding) and the laundry and suitcases were done. I went to sleep at 6 and set my alarm for 8:15. I could not sleep past 8AM and got up and to work with as much energy as if I had slept all night. Theda and Elder and Sister Walker came over. Theda and Sister Walker were nice enough to paint the living room wall from red to tan (like the rest of the house). What great friends I have! I was very appreciative of their willingness to help.

     Elder Walker and I worked on cabinets in the kitchen. We made a good team. He did all the hard work and I fetched the tools and thought ahead to try to have the tools he'd need before he asked for them. After all the other cabinets we got to the tricky one; the dish drawer. Elder Walker was the brave one with the plan. He cut the cabinet to the precise measurements and we slid the dishdrawer into place with just 1/4 on each side in the front where the panel would go to cover (mostly). It was a very snug fit, but it worked!

 Something funny I laugh at is the octagonal hole that Theda and I cut the day before next to the nice circular hole Elder Walker cut the next day... I wasn't sure how to put together Duane's saw hole for the drill, but Elder Walker figured it out.

 We were able to finish installing the last cabinet just minutes before I needed to leave to catch the train with Kalvin. Theda and I stopped for a picture together. With her cute little one behind.

     So, we left the sawdust and tools all over the place, but the cabinets were into place! It was a wonderful feeling!
     Kalvin and I had a great train ride to NYC (taking the train ($60) instead of the megabus ($30) was one of the treats Kalvin was able to get because he was not able to go with the others to Arizona).  I was so impressed with Kalvin for not complaining about the others being with family in Arizona while were working in Albany. There was just one day in the car that he said in a sad tone, "Mom, I really wanted to go to Arizona." I felt so bad for him, but reminded him of the fun things we were able to do in Albany instead: go to a restaurant, go ice skating, go on a train to NYC. He felt much better after that conversation and didn't say anything else about missing Arizona.
We were able to watch the sunset from the train. So cool!

 We walked a mile with the suitcases to our hotel and met Duane and the boys there. On the way over, we walked next to Macy's. Our last moments together!

      I was so excited to see my little boys again and to hold William for a long time. After our reuniting and things had calmed down, I was talking to Duane and told him how his texts made all the difference in how I was feeling the night before and how I was then able to work hard and through the night to accomplish the tasks I so wanted to finish. He was confused. He did not send those text messages. The inspired messages came from a stranger. An inspired stranger.
   As I have had time to think and ponder on this tender mercy, I have been humbled and had a strengthened testimony that God is aware of all our circumstances and that he will find ways to help us in time of need if we look for that help and want it.
    I have since been in contact with this person. They let me know that the texts were intended for a dear friend who lives in Chandler, Arizona and lost their son in a motorcycle accident. The funeral was last week. Our phone numbers are one number apart from each others.
     How humbling to think of all that I have. I have my family. We have our lives. We have a home that keeps us warm and protects us. We have a strong church family that is very helpful and supportive. I am so grateful for the blessings my family has of being healthy and alive. I have so much to be grateful for! It made the tile work and kitchen cabinets seem so much less important.
    
     We had a great time in New York City. I kept in mind that this would probably be the last time we ever make it to the Big Apple and tried to take it all in.

The crowded streets.

 

The good times reading books in bed (Grandma Mickelson got several for each child. All of them were individually wrapped and they could open one a day till the last one Christmas Eve).

The itzy bitsy hotel room and not caring that the boys jumped on their beds.

Waiting for the cleaning lady to finish (we walked in on her a few times while we stayed here).

 Being patient while Tristen or Kalvin pushed the stroller.

 Visiting Toys R Us (a must!)

 Just don't buy candy their... these were $25 for a couple pounds.

 Street vendors food!

 Some thing going on with Santa's EVERYWHERE!

 The big Christmas lights near the Rockefeller Center.

 

 Roasted chestnuts! Our first time ever!

 Piggy back rides

 A random waterfall wall with a cool glass ring around it so you can see it raining.

M&M World!

 Times Square (notice the ad on one of the huge screens).

 Being grumpy some times.

 For whatever reason, this is Tristen's latest pose for the camera.

 Rockefeller Center. The TREE!

 Eating out at 5 guys.

 Nintendo World!

 Meeting Mario.

 Seeing the Empire State Building disappear into the clouds.

 

Meeting Santa at Macy's!

 

 Watching Duane be a great Daddy by getting the baby to sleep.

 

Walking with all our stuff to the bus stop to head back home.

 Once in Albany riding the local bus to get home. Kinda fun too :-)

 Showing Duane the house! Actually, this is the next day when they delivered our counter tops.

 Duane figuring out how to make the counters fit just right.

 Putting in the sink and stove top.

And so, without further adieu, here are the finished projects (well, mostly finished...)!

 Yes, we still need an oven. to go under the stove, but so far the toaster oven is cutting it.

 

The dishdrawer worked, yay!

 

  

Leftover knobs from the other lower cabinets with brown painted screws.

 Hoping that all these things add up to making our house sell easier!