Kitchen Week 1

And we're of and running on the kitchen renovation! It's a race between the baby and this project - which will arrive first? The baby (due August 5th) or the kitchen (goal - 8 weeks = July 30th)?

I'm sure it'll be a photo finish.

Here are the 'before' pictures.

Can't wait to get rid of those ugly 1980's cabinets.

The blue tape on the floor will be the end of the new cabinets. We'll have a pantry next to the fridge, and a slightly smaller countertop.
The ugly generic fluorescent light will be replaced by four recessed lights. The mini-dishwasher will be replaced by a full-size one and re-located towards the right to a new home underneath the soon-to-be-removed window to nowhere.
They'll be a couple of cabinets where the window-to-nowhere now resides.
Shout-out to Micah, Jackson, Joejak and Pryor for coming over to help with the demolition. With their help, we were able to clear out the kitchen in 5 hours.

All the drawers and doors were removed and placed in queue to have their handles removed.
We moved the fridge to the dining room. Pryor removes the base cabinet that was next to the fridge, after un-screwing it from the wall.
Jackson and Micah work on removing the range hood.
Pryor bodyslams the cabinet into the dumpster. This is the fun part of demo!
Jackson and Micah still working on the range hood... should we turn off the breaker?
I launch a wall cabinet into the dumpster...
and in crumbles upon impact!
Bye-bye, ugly ceiling trim.
Jackson heaves a base cabinet.
Jackson unscrews a wall cabinet.
Micah, with a broken left hand, opts for a one-handed shot into the dumpster.
Pryor gives me a hand with the laminate countertop.
We decide to save the top and bottom window halves, but it was too much trouble to save the window frame. Jackson and Micah work on the removal.
Joejak and I start work on the flooring. It turns out we had two layers of underlayment with vinyl or linoleum flooring.
Jackson and Micah still working on the window...
On the wall underneath the window are the remnants of the yellow adhesive used to attach the laminate backsplash.
The walls used to be painted a hideous yellow color, as seen here.
The one-handed bandit pries off the first layer of underlayment/vinyl tile. These were held in place with 18 gauge crown staples, and come up pretty easily in sections.
The second original layer was much more difficult, as it was nailed in place. My experience removing all of the parquet flooring on the first floor came in handy, but this floor was much harder to remove.

Here Micah prepares to sweep a pile of dust into Jackson's face.
The next day I finish removing the remaining exposed nails and give the floor a good vacuuming. That's the old sink light fixture temporarily attached to the wall.

To bring the new flooring up to the elevation of the adjacent room's flooring, we used 5mm plywood underlayment. This is similar to what the previous flooring was attached to.
Here I use my Father's Day gift (a compressor and nailer!) to attach the flooring with 1 1/2" crown staples. This tool definitely helped save time, and will come in handy in the future.
All of the underlayment is attached. Nail guns are fun!

Next weekend will be devoted to building a level plywood base for the floor cabinets. The floating laminate floor is installed after the cabinets, therefore the base is needed to ensure the bottom of the cabinets is even with (or slightly higher) than the finished floor.

Stair Project... Done!

I promised myself that my next project update would be the final one...didn't realize it would take another four weeks, but as you will see, there was quite a bit of work to finish up. Also, we took off a week to take care of the lawn and flower beds.

Before assembling the two smaller drawers, I had to fix the miscut sides. They were cut 1/8" too short on one side, and I decided to fix it instead of wasting four pieces of plywood. Using a circular saw, I cut slivers of wood 1/8" thick tapering down to nothing over about 2'.

I used a router to shave off the excess after the glue dried. No one will ever notice...
With that hurdle overcome, the boxes can be assembled. The bottoms were glued, nailed and screwed down. When in doubt, make it stout!
Since the tops plywood edges are exposed, we decided to veneer them.
The drawer fronts were cut from 1x12 poplar, and I used a Roman Ogee router bit to finish the edges.
Here's the platform for the pullout pantry with the glides attached.
With the platform installed, all we have to do is put the pantry on top and screw it down.

But first we have to build the pantry. During the design process, we were debating what shelf height was required. We decided on five slightly smaller shelves instead of four taller ones, but first needed to test our design.

Can of soup = pass...

Cheez-Its = fail. They'll have to find a home somewhere else.
I decided that the front and back panels of the pantry needed to be more substantial, so I glued two pieces of 1/2" pieces of plywood together.
After each shelf was assembled, the exposed plywood on the edges were veneered.
Now it's assembly time. The first two shelves are in place.
The next three are screwed in, then the back panel is attached. All exposed pocket holes are patched and the pantry is primed and painted.
Before installing the pantry, we decided to pull the floors up. Seemed like a good time to do this since the pantry itself is pretty heavy and may scuff the floor during installation. The plan is to re-do this area so that the floors extend into the small 4"x36" area to the right, inside the pantry door jamb. Seems like a lot of work for a small detail, but the floors install rather easily.
Here I lift the pantry onto the sliding platform. It's not light!
It works!
And it fits! It's a miracle!
At first, I thought I would have one glide oriented sideways at the top of the pantry to provide lateral stability. This is what I've seen on other pullout pantries. But the glides we bought didn't seem to be designed to work sideways, so we decided to put them on the sides. I had to add some support for the right glide.
Here's the top glides installed.

It took a weekend just to do the trim work. Here all the trim is in, and the walls are taped in preparation for painting. Also, the floors were re-installed so they now entend into the pantry.

Between coats of paint, I work on the custom pantry doors. They are a shaker style to match the doors in our house. The door frames are made from 1x3 poplar, and the center panels are 1/2" birch plywood. Now it's time for patching, sanding, priming and painting.
These magnets mounted to the door and jamb are designed to help keep the door closed.
Doors are installed!
The glides on the side of the pantry barely miss scraping the door. Just like I planned it :O)
The pantry was designed so that you only need the right door open to access it.
Here's a closeup of the some of the trimwork.
Now we can install the glides and drawer boxes. All of them fit! A small miracle considering the glides have a 1/16" tolerance to work with.

Cendy gives a hand to help attach the drawer fronts. The strip on the left was attached temporarily to help us keep the drawers in line.

Here are the finished drawers.

And we're done!

Here's the "before" picture...

the concept rendering...

and the finished product.

Stair Project Weeks 4 & 5

It'll fit...it has to fit...

It fits!
Now that the drawer box is screwed down, I work on the face frame. First is the tricky stair-stepped piece which is cut from a 1x12. On the floor is the cardboard template I cut as a test run.
Some 1x2's finish out the face frame. They're tacked in so I can cut them precisely to fit. Now I take them all out to screw them all securely together.
Here's the completed face frame, ready to be re-nailed to the drawer box.
The next phase is the drawer box design and assembly. Here's the two larger drawers. The beer box is in there for scale - looks like we can fit two cases in there...
I would've had all four boxes done today, but I spent some time fixing some miscuts. Remember kids - measure twice, cut once.

Here's the current status. The wood facing has been installed around the pantry doors, and all the nail holes have been filled with putty.