I have been tardy with updates but there has been quite of bit of progress. We went to Timbertown on the weekend and they let us return 5 boxes of unused flooring and then we also picked out 150 feet of baseboard. The baseboard is a nice 5/8″ thick and about 4″ tall which looks quite nice. I called one of the guys that did the flooring install to come do the baseboards, they only charge $1.50/linear foot to install it so it is fairly cheap to get someone else to do it. He did an awesome job and all that is left is to do some painting.

A tile installer (City Tile) has also been booked to do the tile back splash. The tile is a cool 2 x 8″ subway tile that they are going to do in a 3/4 staggered pattern.

The last big thing ordered for the main floor was the bathroom vanity and mirror. We ended up going with the Benjamin Jr vanity from Art Bathe. We were able to see it in person at a bathroom shop here in Calgary but I ended up ordering it online since it was cheaper that way (thanks to the strong Canadian dollar). We still need to paint the bathroom before the vanity can be put in and that will likely happen this next weekend.

The granite installers showed up right on time got the granite all installed in about 3 hours total time. Because the kitchen is fairly small they had quite a difficult time getting the two pieces in properly, they ended up having to move the stove out of the way after the one piece was about half way in order to clear the top cabinets. They had to do one seam in the install while it is noticeable since the granite has lots of unique grain in it it is not that bad at all, I’ve included a picture below.

Overall I am really quite happy with the look of it, it is super shiny and has lots of depth. They also placed in the under mount sink, and drilled a hole for the new faucet but the sink has to sit and dry for at least 24 hours before weight can be put on it. So I will still be without a kitchen for a while longer until the sink and dishwasher are hooked up (next week hopefully). Now for the pictures of the install.

There hasn’t been too much progress lately. Found out that the person that built the IKEA order at IKEA included the wrong cabinets for above the stove and fridge. They were the super deep cabinets, we ended up keeping the 24″ deep cabinet for above the fridge but I had to once again go back to IKEA to exchange the other one for above the stove.

Also found out that the back panel for the IKEA pantry was damaged in shipping so I had to return that as well. They ended up having to open two other pantry cabinet boxese at IKEA since one of the was cracked in the same place (bad packaging I presume). The lady at the return counter ended up giving me some extra shelves for the pantry though since everything from the open box was just going in the trash she said.

I also picked up the rest of the door pulls from Lee Valley since a few were on backorder when we picked them up. On the way back home I stopped at Home Depot and found some base board trim that will work fairly well to cover the exposed part of the kitchen cabinet. We can just paint it the same color as the wall I think.

All the cabinets *should* be done today, and the granite installers are coming tomorrow so I will need to take part of the day off it looks like. The only things left in the kitchen is the under cabinet lighting and then getting the tile back splash installed (which won’t be done until the new year I think).

The floors were finished off on Friday and they look really good. Its finally feeling like the place is starting to come together.

I spent some time on Saturday taping carboard boxes down to the floor to protect them from the cabinent installers who are suppose to be finishing up all the upper cabinets as I type this. I will post some pictures here tonight hopefully.

Also had a surprise call from the granite shop on Friday, they said the granite cutting and polishing was all done and that then could book an install for this week, so they are coming on Friday to install the granite! That will mean I should have a working kitchen on the weekend!

I also spend time on Saturday wall mounting my plasma screen, it sure is nice having it off the floor, the install isn’t quite complete since I still need to run HDMI and power cables to the basement. As well as find a solution for IR distribution (I want to keep all the equipment in the basement).

Things left to do (I’m sure I am missing something).

1. Pick out baseboards and get them installed.
2. Find trim piece for back of upper cabinets.
3. Pick out vanity for downstairs bathroom.
4. Repair drywall in downstairs bathroom and paint whole bathroom.
5. Try and return some of the left over boxes of hardwood (I ordered 5 boxes to many).
6. New door handles for all the doors in the house (just say no to brass colored hardware!)
7. Run HDMI cables through the wall for the TV.
8. Paint touch ups and painting baseboards.

I am still hoping that everything will be done by Christmas, it is going to be a bit of a stretch I think though.

Just a couple pictures of the flooring that has gone in, they are about 1/3 of the way done I would say. It is looking pretty good so far, but it sure feels different right now, I think it will feel better once all the furniture is moved back into the room, right now it really feels empty.

Cindy and I went to the granite shop today to take a look at the slab they had for us. We were originally told they were getting around 10 slabs in and we would likely be able to get a choice of the one we wanted, however there was some kind of mix up on the shipment and they only had two slabs in the shop, one that was already spoken for. Luckily of the two the one we prefered was the one they had set aside for us.

The granite looks great, it is very close in color to the sample piece they gave us when we first started looking. It has lots of grain and quartz and “fish scale” in it as well. They are going to start the cutting process tomorrow so the counters should be ready in a week or two which is great news. They also gave us a bit of a cut on the price for the piece of granite for top of the pass through wall so that should really finish off the kitchen.

One step closer to a finished project, however also one step back. The flooring guys called this morning saying they were not able to make it today as two guys called in sick. They are now suppose to be starting tomorrow and it will hopefully be done by Friday. The place should look a lot different once they floors are in.

This past weekend Cindy and I picked out the handles for the kitchen cabinets and pantry. We ended up going with a stainless steel square tube handle from Lee Valley. They are a nice chunky handle that still looks fairly modern.

For the upper cabinets we’re using the one listed as “B” in that picture and for the pantry cabinets and the big drawers we are using the longer ones labeled “G”. They should looks really good on the white cabinets, and they look much better then a lot of the stock handles that IKEA sells.

This past weekend my brother and I spent most of Saturday ripping up all the K3 underlay that was under all the old lino in my place. Luckily the K3 wasn’t glued down (it was only nailed) but it was still a lot of work to tear up. The majority of the work had to be done with crowbars and hammers. After ripping all the K3 up and removing any nails left in the floor we tackled the carpet, as of now all the carpet on the main floor is gone and I have nice empty OSB subfloor showing everywhere.

Here is the kitchen floor before we started.

The kitchen floor after 30 mins of work.

Another picture of the kitchen ripped out and new cabinets.

The rest of the carpet ripped out and the pile of hardwood.

The dining area ripped out.

The flooring guys are scheduled to start tomorrow so hopefully it will start looking like a house once again.

So I now have a new dishwasher on its way. Sears.ca had a sale on a few weekends ago for $400 off a Kenmore Elite dishwasher, turns out that it is actually made by Bosch so it is a fairly good machine. I missed the sale on the weekend but I called and they were able to give it to me at the sale price.

It is being delivered this next weekend, however it doesn’t look like I will have a working kitchen by then :p

I recently decided to start some renovations on my place. The current plan is to replace all the flooring on the main floor with maple hardwood, new baseboards, replace the kitchen cabinets, replace the kitchen counter top, new dishwasher, new pantry cabinets to replace the shelves in the back hall (which are a HUGE waste of space currently) and finally replace the vanity in the half bath downstairs.

So far I have bought the following:

Maple hardwood (from Timbertown).

“Adel White” Kitchen and pantry cabinets (from IKEA).

Deposit on the “Star Beach” granite counter tops (Silkstone Granite).

Will try and get some pictures up here of the before and progress pictures as well.