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TOH - Kitchen Project #3, Little Things

A few days after returning from Florida, Shawn, a master craftsman, came over to check out the progress and give me some pointers. By sheer luck (or bad luck), Makoto, also a perfectionist master craftsman, found out what was going on and also generously came to give me a hand. The three of us finished putting up the remaining sheet rock and Shawn taught me how to tape and mud. He also patched up the major holes while Makoto was cutting the sheet rock.

Is this a rare shot of Shawn cheesin'? You do have warpaint on, so maybe no one will recognize you. And the dust on Makoto's face - classic. He's wearing all work clothes. :OThe following Sunday, Eric's parents approached me -- mostly out of fear for what their son may have done. They wanted to make sure that everything was OK and that Eric hadn't caused undue harm. I assured them that he hadn't, but it turned out that Eric's dad, Vincent, had the day off and wanted to come by the next day. There were GIANT holes between the new ceiling and the old wall. Like 1-2 gaps. I would either have to use tons of mud to fill, or go with crown molding to hide the holes. While Vincent and Eric were over, we decided to go with the molding and we made a trip to Lowe's. That day, I finished coating the new exterior wood trim and Hardee siding with new primer and paint while Vincent completed the crown molding by hand. Eric took care of all the caulking in the meanwhile. We should have used a miter saw and some other vital tools for the molding... but oh well. It's done and it looks great. Those guys hung out all day at my place and probably saved me a week's worth of individual work.

My final step in construction was getting the ceiling finished. There seemed to be so many opinions and so many different ways to do the texturing of the ceiling that I felt more and more overwhelmed. Instead, I spent several days trying to get the ceiling smooth so I wouldn't have to worry about texture. That turned out to be a waste of time. All I could see was lumps and bubbles all over the place. A novice like me wasn't going to get a long, flat surface smooth enough. Luckily, by sheer luck (again), I talked to someone who extremely graciously (again) came over to give me a hand. George came over within just a few hours notice and showed me how to texture. He taught me the technique where you spread some mud on a flat square surface and lightly press it up on the ceiling. Then, you use a big long putty knife and scrape it flat with even pressure. Make sure to scrape in the same direction for a nice, uniform look. It was so easy it only took about two hours (mostly b/c I had the wrong kind of mud). George saved my ceiling!

Here is the textured ceiling along with crown molding and a re-finished sky light.
I seemed to face a new kind of anxiety every time I got to a new part of the project. The last part was the painting. I know. This had to be the easiest part. But if I picked the wrong color, I would be in big trouble. My neighbor Angela saved the day again! She brought over about 50 swatches, based on her memory of my tile and cabinet color. Within 3 minutes, she had it down to 3 swatches. Wow - how did she do that? So I picked the one I liked and everything was set. Since I didn't need a ton, I thought it would be wise to invest in a high-quality paint. Plus, with kids around, I thought the new No-VOC paint would be the way to go. I think this stuff costs more, but is better than Home Depots' good stuff, Behr - Mythic, from Ace Hardware on 400 South.
The painting took time. The big flat parts were easy to roll out. But taping, painting the edges, corners, etc. took a lot of time. By the time I started painting, I only had a few days before Wami and Taisei came back from Japan. I wanted to be done a day prior so that I could move all the heavy furniture back into the kitchen. I also need to put up the new lighting. In my overachieving mood, I also bought some under cabinet lighting that had to be installed. This entailed drilling holes in the cabinets, running wires, etc. The entire four weeks or so was intense. I barely got homework done and studying for finals... yikes... that was reflected in my Managerial Accounting final. (But I still passed the class :)

To my own amazement, I got it all done before they returned. Later on, I ended up switching out the Ikea lights for something brighter from Home Depot. (I would not recommend a lot of Ikea's lighting. You get what you pay for. The under cabinet lights stink too, but too much trouble to take back out.) I also finished painting the trim and removing the tape.

So, for compare and contrast, here is the old kitchen. If you blow this up, you'll see that in the old days, this kitchen was so cold that we would prop the oven open and leave it on!
And here is the finished, new kitchen, complete with insulation, radiant floor heating, new porcelain tiles, new lighting, crown molding, a new ceiling, a fresh coat of paint, new windows, and new doors.
Ironically, most of the real, hard work is inside the walls and can't be appreciated by the average person who does not follow this blog. But at least I got in some minor cosmetic upgrades for a slightly more elegant feel for those who remember the ghetto-ness of the old kitchen. :)

Lastly, the credits. Special thanks to all the helpers:

• Andrew - manual labor
• Angela - Designer: tile & paint
• Eric - Project Engineer: supplies, demo, sheet rock, mudding, sanding
• Mike H. - supplies, gutter
• Troy - sheet rock
• Drew - sheet rock
• Shawn -supplies, sheet rock, caulking
• Makoto - sheet rock, sanding
• Vincent - mudding, sanding, crown molding
• George - ceiling texture
• Leah - Priming
• Warren - lighting, manual labor

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