Clearing the Deck

Sharron and I made two trips to the dump and cleared off all of the kitchen demolition debris that we had staged on the deck.  This included the sinks from the kitchen and powder room, lots of baseboard, cabinet pieces, a closet door and underlayment for the original linoleum floor.  This is how it looked after the first trip:

Here's all of that cut up with our handy Hilti sawzall and ready to load into my car:

We managed to get it all in with not much space to spare!

And here is the deck after cleanup.  We have two trashcans full of linoleum floor that the trash collectors will take later this week.  The lumber is excess cedar boards from our April fence project that we need to deal with.  The small boards are excellent for cedar plank grilling salmon. 

On our way home from the dump, we stopped off at The Great Indoors and found a support frame for a ceramic plate that we had purchased in Cascais, Portugal and hand carried home on the plane.  We had used it for a while as a serving platter, but it developed a crack and is now a decorative piece. 

The Wall Unit

Sharron unloaded the wall unit and we moved it in three stages to its new home in the family room.  The printer and two routers are now on a shelf in the left-hand unit, and the other shelves have been repopulated.

We unloaded the construction tools from the dining room table and moved it next to the wall previously occupied by the wall unit.  The donation items that we will give to the Viet Nam Vets organization are under the table.  The sofa will be moved later, when the piano and gaming TV have been moved out of the way.

And the bookcase is temporarily in the hallway until space is available in the living room.

I painted more trim and Amanda baked some zombie cupcakes - very yummy!

Tomorrow morning, Sharron and I plan to cut up a bunch of the old kitchen flooring that we stored on the deck, and haul it to the dump.  We look forward to having the uncluttered use of our deck again, and will be giving it a new coat of paint in the coming weeks.

The Desk

This "kitchen project" really encompasses the entire first floor, since we are also changing a lot of the furniture in the living room and family room, as well as renovating the kitchen, dining room, powder room and hallway.  Sharron unloaded the desk in the family room today and we moved it out to the garage.  The neighbors will pick it up this weekend.  The plan is to relocate the 96" wall unit to the space vacated by the desk and bookcase, which will be moved out of the way on Saturday. 
 

Family room wall after desk removal - routers and printer remaining

 

 

Computer desk and printer stand

Of course, the stuff from the desk and bookcase is now cluttering the family room!
 

    
Meanwhile, I continued painting trim.  The unpainted parts of the baseboard will be covered later by the quarter round.

Adding a Fourth

This morning, I assembled the additional lazy susan shelf that arrived yesterday.  I unloaded and lowered two of the shelves to make room, and added the new shelf on top.  Even at an angle, it was not easy to squeeze the shelf inside, and I had to drop the lower shelves on top of each other to finally get the new top shelf inside the cabinet.  Here's how it looks at the moment, before we load up the top shelf with stuff that will require our kitchen ladder to reach.

The next task was to add the pull bars to our 2 spice drawers.  Here's one after installation:

I had just started painting the door trim when the doorbell rang.  Our counter chairs were here!  And shortly thereafter, a knock at the door signaled the delivery of our 18 gauge brad nail gun, which will be quite handy for attaching quarter round to the baseboards.

Door trim painting in progress - blue tape for edging 

Chairs and nailer staged in hallway

Sharron arrived home from work just as I was unpacking the chairs.  We got the first one assembled in time for her to give it a test drive at the island while eating dinner.  As Murphy would have it, we assembled the first chair with the foot rest misaligned (on the side instead of in front) and had to remove four bolts and set it right.  With the knowledge of how not to do it, we got the second chair assembled correctly and with a bit less effort.  Here's Sharron doing the hard part of getting the bolts started in a very tight space inside the spring-loaded swivel assembly:

Note the coaster, used as a shim, while installing bolts

Here's the finished product.  We found our new perches at the end of the island to be a good vantage point for bird watching. 

Last, but not least, I opened the box containing the brad nailer and actually read the instruction manual!  This tool will be a huge time saver (and produce superior results) in installing quarter round. 

Hitachi brad nailer with 2400 brads of various sizes

Back-order Delivery

Our back-ordered cabinet items arrived today.  The only exception is the decorative face pieces for the spice drawers.  Since those will be several weeks in coming, I will install the pull bars on the spice drawers to make it much easier to open them.  I can re-mount the pull bars on the face pieces later. 

Lazy susan shelf, additional shelves for cabinets, valence, overhang supports, cabinet 

The cabinet will be mounted above the refrigerator.  The valence goes above the sink.  The additional lazy susan shelf goes in the corner wall cabinet, and the overhang supports go under the granite ledge at the near end of the island.  They are more decorative than structural.  The island drawers in this photo now have the pull bars, which were delivered and installed today. 

Pull Bars and Wall Touch-up

The wall touch-up painting is now complete, and all pull bars are on the cabinets, except for the two spice drawers that will be completed when the decorative face pieces arrive, and three other drawers that need smaller pull bars than the ones originally provided.  We expect the cabinet supplier to deliver all of this soon.

Here's the view of the cabinets with pull bars installed:

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I managed to get in a morning bike ride to Lake Needwood, and after lunch, Amanda and I went to Great Falls, MD for a short walk.  The sky was perfectly clear - not a single cloud today, but it was quite hot in the sun, so we didn't stay too long.  Here are a few shots from our walk today:

On the C&O Canal with Great Falls Tavern in the background

On the path to Olmstead Overlook

Hanging eight on the C&O Canal

Fishing in the waters of the Potomac River

Reflecting on Today's Work

I installed the new mirror in the powder room today, and couldn't resist a self-portrait.


Here's the finished product, complete with mirror, hair dryer and pull bars on the cabinet.  I also installed five pull bars in the kitchen and finished the ceiling touch-up paint.






































Our resident Fire Protection Engineer has certified the fire extinguisher that I installed by the stove this afternoon.





























And last, but not least, we installed Sharron's second wall hanging in the dining room.