See you in H, dysfunctional kitchen

The least attractive room of our house is easily the kitchen. While it came with some cool things, like cupboards with solid copper handles and a quality gas stove, it came with a lot of stupid things. There is a pantry, but it has a door, which makes one of the walls only half-useable. Dada is peeking out of the pantry here. Look at all that unused space! Lame.


It also did not come with a dishwasher, which, if you know me, is a recipe for disaster. Luckily, Meemaw and Pawpaw (whose name, by the way, is evolving into PopPop. Just so you know, PopPop.) helped us out and bought us a convertible dishwasher according to our expectation that we would eventually remodel and install it into the countertop like it should be. Currently, the dishwasher resides on the Useless Wall, and must be dragged over to the sink once a day to do its duty. The house did come with a fridge, one that had been unplugged and uncleaned for who knows how long, one that had become a sanctuary for untold numbers of mold species. It was so gross that Dadaw and Mamaw bought us a new one, and a stainless steel one at that.

Are you jealous of my babies' grandparents or what?

In addition, one wall of the kitchen, the wall that contains the pantry, is not there. In its place is The Death Rail, also known as The Place Where Crawling Babies Come to Fall Down Some Stairs. These stairs lead to the basement stairs and are not baby-proofable in their current state. The rail is also a constant source of amusement for the toddler, who enjoys throwing all kinds of things over it and down the basement stairs. Crayons, Buzz Lightyear, meatballs...you name it, I find it after it has bounced into the basement. Bad news. Just bad.


And don't get me started on the linoleum. In every other room in the house, you are surrounded by beautiful wood flooring, unless you are in the bathroom and you are greeted by super-cute pink 1" ceramic tile. In the kitchen, you have ugly, cracked linoleum that is gapped in places to increase its dirt-collecting properties.


So, do you get the picture? Gross, cracking lineoleum. No proper home for the refrigerator or dishwasher. Stairs that cannot be babyproofed. Before we even moved in, Dada had a dream. In this dream, there is no rail, but instead a solid wall. There is no pantry. The cabinets are on the complete opposite side of the kitchen. The refrigerator and dishwasher are built into a wall of cabinets. There is a ceramic tile floor.

Dada bought all-new cabinets from Ikea this summer. And now that Dadaw and Mamaw are headed out this way next week, it is suddenly time for stuff to happen. Yesterday and today, Dada began demolishing the pantry.



After the pantry is torn up, Dada will create a wall where the rail is, and wall-in the pantry. Dada anticipates the new wall will be in place by week's end, at which time he can move the fridge and start installing the top cabinetry. At a much later date, the back of the pantry will be torn out to open up the basement stairs and install assorted pretty and functional lighting there.

When Dadaw comes, he will be helping Dada to lay our new flooring, reroute the gas lines and plumbing to the new wall, and possibly cut and install the countertop. To save money but also look super-classy, we chose marble floor tile as our new countertop. Wanna see? The new floor tile is on the right; the new countertop tile (did I mention it's marble!) is on the left.


This will go with our new cabinetry, which I haven't taken a picture of, but looks great in somebody else's kitchen here. Because Dada is crazy for fun colors, we are thinking of painting the walls a light lilac or plum.

You can perhaps imagine the requisite suckage that comes with looking after two curious boys while this is going on. Dada has issued the mandate of "No Jakey in the kitchen!" since he started pulling down the dirty, dusty pantry walls. And, with no pantry or available cabinet space right now, our food supply is laying out everywhere, making everything cluttered and uncute. Dada says it is only temporary, and hopefully he'll have some cabinets hung by the weekend, at which time I can put the food away in there, at least for now.

Though the boys and I are a bit inconvenienced by this, I am so excited to have a kitchen that works, that has space, that has places for things to go. One that has a functional icemaker. One that has a place for a baby gate to guard the stairs.

I must say that I am also so proud, yet again, that my husband is the handiest fella I know. He is doing this mostly by himself in his spare time, with help from Dadaw (who is a tie for the handiest fella I know). He does excellent work and has excellent taste and, weirdly enough, he enjoys it. We are truly lucky to have him as our Dada!