Yesterday, a Sears repairman came over. He replaced an electronic control panel on my stove (which is just over a year old) and which had a wonky #1. Sometimes worked, sometimes wouldn't.
The part cost $411. The labour was $60. Fortunately between the warranty and service plan, I paid nothing. I can't remember exactly what we paid for the thing but I think this is about a 1/3 of the original purchase price. This is a high-end Kenmore Elite dual fuel; ultimately made by Electrolux apparently because that's what the box that the replacement unit came in said.
This afternoon, I have a bunch of sweet children coming to party with Hugo, who is having his birthday party a couple days early. I was planning to heat up some frozen pizzas.
Do you see where this is going?
You betcha. The oven won't turn on.
I sure hope the repair guy they're sending out this morning is not the same one who came yesterday because I might just snap. And since we'll have a bunch of hungry, over-excited kids here, I can inflict some punishment on him. I might just throw him down to the party room and have him supervise.
Showing posts with label kitchen reno. Show all posts
Showing posts with label kitchen reno. Show all posts
Saturday, April 26, 2008
Friday, February 23, 2007
pop tarts - not as good as we expected
Well, yes, navhelowife, I did want to run away from home. It wasn't all bad, but the fact that it was happening in December, a month which makes me incredibly squirrely at the best of times, was just a bit of a challenge.
Not only was there the overarching pressure of OMG, the children need Christmas presents, we need a tree, shouldn't we chuck some lights at the house, else not only will we be bad parents but bad neighbours, but Amelia's birthday falls on the 12th. (Let me just advise all parents to avoid birthing a child in any month which also has a major holiday in it. You can count to 9 and figure out quite clearly which months are taboo. I clearly wasn't thinking the first time around. Didn't too well the second either as Hugo's is awfully close to the ever wandering Easter.)
Then, this being the winter that Gaia decided to show Vancouver that wearing birkenstocks and buying coffee in your own mug rather than wasting a paper cup is not enough to save the earth, we had storm after storm after storm. Power outages were rampant - which is a bit of a problem once you've yanked out your gas cooktop and the kitchen consists of a coffee-maker, toaster, microwave, and electric kettle. When you have no power and the gas range is in the dumpster, your cooking options decrease dramatically.
Fortunately we have two camping stoves and, along with a CO detector at hand, we managed several meals that way. Including, in fact, Christmas Eve, when we hosted a traditional dinner.
That's me, cooking pierogies in the garage.
The kids were thrilled at the beginning of the reno as we went grocery shopping and bought all the foods we usually don't get. Frozen entrees, boil in a bag, just microwave, ready in 5 minutes! Food that was downright exotic for us. If I could cook it in a microwave or a toaster, I threw it in the cart.
Including PopTarts. We had never had PopTarts before. Our whole experience with the food was limited to an episode of Father Ted in which Ted and Dougal hire a nun to help them keep their lenten vows and she turns out to be from some masochistic sect devoted to mortifying the flesh. Sister Assumpta wakes them at 5 a.m. and gives them plain water for breakfast while Dougal dreamily recounts how he loves a PopTart in the morning. She then proceeds to give them ice baths, beat them with sticks and give them a jolly Catholic time. The entire episode is hilarious but somehow what stuck with Hugo was the line about Father Dougal loving his PopTarts in the morning.
Hugo chanted this through the entire shopping trip until we made it the correct aisle. He selected a large variety box.
Turned out we all hated them and it took over a month for them to finally be reluctantly consumed.
Not only was there the overarching pressure of OMG, the children need Christmas presents, we need a tree, shouldn't we chuck some lights at the house, else not only will we be bad parents but bad neighbours, but Amelia's birthday falls on the 12th. (Let me just advise all parents to avoid birthing a child in any month which also has a major holiday in it. You can count to 9 and figure out quite clearly which months are taboo. I clearly wasn't thinking the first time around. Didn't too well the second either as Hugo's is awfully close to the ever wandering Easter.)
Then, this being the winter that Gaia decided to show Vancouver that wearing birkenstocks and buying coffee in your own mug rather than wasting a paper cup is not enough to save the earth, we had storm after storm after storm. Power outages were rampant - which is a bit of a problem once you've yanked out your gas cooktop and the kitchen consists of a coffee-maker, toaster, microwave, and electric kettle. When you have no power and the gas range is in the dumpster, your cooking options decrease dramatically.
Fortunately we have two camping stoves and, along with a CO detector at hand, we managed several meals that way. Including, in fact, Christmas Eve, when we hosted a traditional dinner.
That's me, cooking pierogies in the garage. The kids were thrilled at the beginning of the reno as we went grocery shopping and bought all the foods we usually don't get. Frozen entrees, boil in a bag, just microwave, ready in 5 minutes! Food that was downright exotic for us. If I could cook it in a microwave or a toaster, I threw it in the cart.
Including PopTarts. We had never had PopTarts before. Our whole experience with the food was limited to an episode of Father Ted in which Ted and Dougal hire a nun to help them keep their lenten vows and she turns out to be from some masochistic sect devoted to mortifying the flesh. Sister Assumpta wakes them at 5 a.m. and gives them plain water for breakfast while Dougal dreamily recounts how he loves a PopTart in the morning. She then proceeds to give them ice baths, beat them with sticks and give them a jolly Catholic time. The entire episode is hilarious but somehow what stuck with Hugo was the line about Father Dougal loving his PopTarts in the morning.
Hugo chanted this through the entire shopping trip until we made it the correct aisle. He selected a large variety box.
Turned out we all hated them and it took over a month for them to finally be reluctantly consumed.
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
project creep
Project creep. Depending on context it might be the guy you've been assigned to work with, the 47 year old one who lives with his mom and collects celebritys' nail clippings.
However, in our case, it was the same sort of thinking that got us into cutting holes in outside walls in December. Hey, wouldn't it be good if......? And if we're doing this already, then isn't this the best time to do that? It would only slow us down a bit and it would only cost a bit.
Bit is a word that has a very fluid meaning, and its fluidity increases during the stress of a renovation.
How much more expensive is that one compared to this one?
How long will it take to order that part?
How much more time until the power in the entire living room stops shorting out every time we plug in the toaster?
Are you tired?
Do you want to eat?
Does that cut hurt?
Is it bleeding?
A bit, a bit, a bit.
OK, back to the creep. If look back at the photo in the Kitchen Before post, you'll see this thing which kind of looks like a box, and runs along the top of the window, and top of the left hand cupboards. For lack of a better word, we called it a box. Above it on the wall was cedar panelling (these people loved cedar panelling. Whole chunks of this house are covered in cedar. It's like a sweat lodge in here.)
We planned right from the beginning to rip the cedar panelling off and indeed, that was one of the first things we did, even before the kitchen reno got started. That was where we made holes in the wall to figure out where the loads went.
Taking off the box was kind of something that really became more and more important to us as we went along. We wanted to open up the room more, to really pump up the vaulting of the ceiling. We also figured that if we got rid of that box, we could use taller cabinets on the left side of the kitchen. The right side of the kitchen was not negotiable. There's a huge frigging beam there on that wall and so our top line was defined by the structure of the building.
But along the window, and on the left, that box was decorative and empty. Simple enough to take it down, put some drywall there, and presto. Easy, peasy.
Except that this house was apparently built by someone who was taking the cold war and living in an earthquake zone seriously. It is solid. The box was gyproc - but very heavy and thick; thicker than what we can buy now because we wanted to buy something the same thickness to make a patch and the people in the hardware store just looked blankly at us. "Umm, it doesn't come in that thickness. "
However, in our case, it was the same sort of thinking that got us into cutting holes in outside walls in December. Hey, wouldn't it be good if......? And if we're doing this already, then isn't this the best time to do that? It would only slow us down a bit and it would only cost a bit.
Bit is a word that has a very fluid meaning, and its fluidity increases during the stress of a renovation.
How much more expensive is that one compared to this one?
How long will it take to order that part?
How much more time until the power in the entire living room stops shorting out every time we plug in the toaster?
Are you tired?
Do you want to eat?
Does that cut hurt?
Is it bleeding?
A bit, a bit, a bit.
OK, back to the creep. If look back at the photo in the Kitchen Before post, you'll see this thing which kind of looks like a box, and runs along the top of the window, and top of the left hand cupboards. For lack of a better word, we called it a box. Above it on the wall was cedar panelling (these people loved cedar panelling. Whole chunks of this house are covered in cedar. It's like a sweat lodge in here.)
We planned right from the beginning to rip the cedar panelling off and indeed, that was one of the first things we did, even before the kitchen reno got started. That was where we made holes in the wall to figure out where the loads went.
Taking off the box was kind of something that really became more and more important to us as we went along. We wanted to open up the room more, to really pump up the vaulting of the ceiling. We also figured that if we got rid of that box, we could use taller cabinets on the left side of the kitchen. The right side of the kitchen was not negotiable. There's a huge frigging beam there on that wall and so our top line was defined by the structure of the building.
But along the window, and on the left, that box was decorative and empty. Simple enough to take it down, put some drywall there, and presto. Easy, peasy.
Except that this house was apparently built by someone who was taking the cold war and living in an earthquake zone seriously. It is solid. The box was gyproc - but very heavy and thick; thicker than what we can buy now because we wanted to buy something the same thickness to make a patch and the people in the hardware store just looked blankly at us. "Umm, it doesn't come in that thickness. "
That's the ugly door to the deck. If we hadn't been totally wrung out by the damned box, we might have been seduced into project creep there. The door needs to be changed but we're not sure into what. A full slider or just a plain white & glass door, like half a french door? It stayed for now.
The dust was incredible. We tried to corrall it a bit by hanging a tarp up and using fans to send the dust outside but it was only partly successful.
This is the kids' felt pen box.
And then Roo had to go back to work.
Before we started, we had created a kitchen reno schedule, one which was all nicely written out and 'project planned' with actions/people/time all filled in in appropriate slots. Unfortunately, we didn't meet our schedule.
The demo took about as long as we had planned.
Wiring took longer.
Plumbing took longer.
Framing & installing the new window took longer.
Ripping off the fake ceiling box - was completely unplanned & pushed us way off schedule.
Roo had to go back to work for two weeks, and then he'd be home again during the Christmas holidays. He worked during the week while I laid siege to drywall. Tape, mud, watch it dry, sand, dust, repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.
On the two weekends, Roo finished with the wiring and plumbing. We also started building the Ikea cabinets in the living room and garage.
If you look closely you'll see there still is a jog in the wall above the window. There is a large beam just above the window header and it sticks out a bit. We made the wall above the beam flush with it and just have a small jog in that wall. The exposed beam up by the ceiling will eventually be painted our white trim color. Looking good and we're happy with how it's turning out.
It's awfully close to Christmas though.
Monday, February 19, 2007
More demo and the window
A close up of the mess the tiles left on the wall. That's my hand chiseling at the crap stuck to it. After a while we tried power sanding instead.
When we were getting ready for the reno, we had this brilliant idea of enlarging the kitchen window. The windows in this house all need replacing anyway as they're single glazed so of course we would replace the window while doing the kitchen. But as we looked at our designs, we kept coming back to the fact that the backyard of this property, with the creek and slope and green belt, is really an amazing feature which should be showcased more. What better way to do it than to expand the windows? We decided we'd like to have the window extend over both the sink and the dishwasher.There was a smallish snag in that we didn't actually know for sure how this house was constructed. We knew it wasn't quite standard framing, but we only had a hazy idea of how the loads were carried. We did some research, and some exploratory ripping off walls to look beneath, discovered it's mostly post and beam, and decided it was doable. All it needed was a new header.
Here is my very efficient carpenter. Roo is a jack of all trades, Mr. Handy, funny and gorgeous to boot. Office warrior by day, power tool wizard by night.
That's the new header. Gorgous, ain't it? Notice that it's daytime. After the header went in and a bunch of magic voodoo was done involving kings, studs, and cripples (that's window framing talk), Roo cut a huge freaking hole in the wall and got ready to install the new window.
Um, how did it get to be night? And if you look close it appears that Roo is breathing fire. It is bloody cold by this time. (It dawns on us that maybe cutting holes in walls in December is not such a great idea.) Roo's on the deck, getting the caulking in. The new window finally went in around 10 pm at night. You would not believe how many times we measured, re-measured, and measured again, to make sure this sucker would fit and that we wouldn't have some collossal gaps around it.
Hurray! It fits!That's my mom - our handy assistant - outside in the watchman's cap.
~~~~~
To be continued.
Demo!
The morning of the demolition. Fridge moved off to the side, dishwasher still needs to be disconnected and safely hidden for the duration. Cupboards were emptied and the contents moved to temporary shelves in the living room. I had a microwave oven & a toaster set up by the table. I did the dishes in several large tupperare bins in the bathtub.
Hugo getting into the demolition. We rented a skip to haul away all the ugly stuff.
Confused dog. Hey! Where is the cupboard that has my food?!
When you pry tiles off a wall, the results are not pretty. Initially we thought we would either pry them off gently, without damaging the wall too much, or simply rip off the wall and put in fresh drywall. Ahem. Stay tuned for how that ended.
The previous people had apparently not heard of this invention called an ELECTRICAL BOX. We keep finding connections just left like that. Argh.more icky kitchen
September 2006
This is what it looked like after few months of us living here. Your eye will inevitably be drawn to the gorgeous dishwasher Roo put in during the summer. That would be the second one he put in. If you recall, over the last few months, I made him take out the original dishwasher and put in a new one, take it out, replace the old clunker while we continued shopping, and then put in a second dishwasher. Each time there was much swearing and some blood loss because the floor was built in around the dishwasher so dishwashers doesn't actually really want to fit in through the opening. Yes, I am fun to live with.
I got rid of the window rags, the blinds, the dustcatcher crap on top of the cupboards, and the 'island' on wheels. Let me tell you, I hate kitchen islands. Almost all kitchens that have them are too SMALL for them. If you want an island, you need a really large kitchen. I need space!!!
The countertop made of tiles - one word: gross. Is that colored grout or dirt or grease? Bleh. Do not put tiles on a kitchen countertop. I think that can qualify as a life rule.
The cupboards are the original 1966 cupboards, but with 1980's laminate doors. Bleh. Double bleh when you consider the issue of little furry tenants.
The kitchen was just barely tolerable and originally we planned to do bathrooms first, and then the kitchen. But, this is an open living house. The kitchen is part of the living room, and hell, it was ugly. And then, in the fall, Ikea advertised a sale on their kitchen cabinets. Hmmmmmmmmmm.
You know where this is going, right?
Besides. The dishwasher looked lonely and sad in this dump. It wanted to be among its own kind. It called to its clan members, the matching fridge and stove.....
Kitchen before
March 2006
This is how the kitchen looked in the original realtor's listing photos.
Maybe this is a sign of the insanity of the market here because when you see this in a house priced over 500K, you think, hmmm, that's quite good! An 80's kitchen! Wow, it was updated in the last quarter century? It doesn't look like it was used as a grow op or a boarding house for 60 students from Guangzhou? Let's buy it.