We’re half way through the renovation!  I must admit, it’s pretty nice hiring a residential and commercial plumbing contractor to come do most of the work.  What they do in a day would take me months–seriously.  The goal end date is next Friday & it is going to be BEAUTIFUL!

Here are some progress pics:

The dining room is our current “kitchen”. Microwave + fridge= a lot of takeout.

The night before. Do you even realize how much stuff you keep in your kitchen cabinets?  Sheesh.

Notice the textured ceiling. It’s a magnet for dust & not very attractive. The holes are for the electrical work getting done by Aardvark Electric, Inc.

These are our new doors.  The old ones were made of wood & should never have been used for exterior doors since they morph in shape due to the weather.  These doors are aluminum & will hold up a lot better and will help our a/c & heat actually stay inside; we decided to have Geothermal Heating and Air installed throughout the house.  Our old doors had grids on them but we opted out with the new doors since none of our windows have them.  I like the more ‘open’ feel of it, although I can only imagine the dog paw prints that will show up on there. We are planning to add an outdoor furniture set to the outside deck. You can click here to see where I got my lighting fixtures.

This is what it looks like today!  Believe it or not, I think it’s pure awesomeness – I also took some help from various services (you could try here). The gas line has been changed, outlets put in for under cabinet lighting, walls prepped for backsplash, & fluorescent lights out/can lights in!  The lighting alone makes me giddy. Soft lighting makes a humongous difference in the feel of the room.

Lastly, the ceiling got scraped and re-mudded!  At least one room in our house will have a nice looking ceiling. (Side story: Alex & I were laying in bed the other night and he said “man, I notice all of our textured ceilings now”.  I guess he never did before, but I couldn’t NOT notice them!) If you want to reduce the stress while renovating, there are expert contractor firms and manuals that can help you, learn more about it using the last link.

On Monday the cabinet guy should come with some new cabinetry for one side of the room & he’ll also be spraying the cabinets (painting).  Thursday is when the countertops should be ready, then the guys can install all the appliances, do the backsplash, and finish up any last details and on Friday we should be finished!!!