So after the demo of these rooms, here's what happened next! Riveting, right? I know you're on the edge of your seat. Okay, but seriously.
Once the bar frame had been built, we realized it was too high. Even sitting in bar stools, our arms would have been raised to rest on it. See?
So we called our contractor and that afternoon his guys came back and lowered it about 4 inches. They were in and out of the house in 20 minutes flat--no exaggeration. I was painting there, so I know. Seriously, this is why you hire experts to do things you have no idea how to do. That would have taken me ages. Anyway, moving on. You can tell it's lower in this pic below based on where the wood hits the wall near the red paint.
It was around this time that our contractor adamantly stated that we needed to drywall our ceiling. I think his actual words were something like "Seriously, I don't want you to tell people that we did your kitchen makeover if your ceiling still looks like that. That's bad for business." So he gave us a good deal and had some guys come drywall the ceiling the same time they were going to drywall the bar and fridge wall.
Here it is the day after they put up the drywall. The kitchen tile had also been laid and not grouted yet,
and the countertops had just been installed. Because the ceiling was being drywalled, the lights had been removed. Sorry for the lack of light!
We patched up the major holes and I had two paint options here on the wall, and I was trying to compare them to the counters. It didn't help the lighting was off.
Hurray for beautiful new counters at a third of the price! And a new sink! And new tile floor that looks like hardwood! Things are starting to come together.
We got the counters installed for a third of the price of normal quartz. Our realtor, a friend of mine, took us to a local store where the owners were literally just trying to get rid of their quartz. They had received the quartz for free when they bought a shipment of granite from someone else (who was also getting rid of quartz ...apparently the demand is really just for granite these days), so they were still making money by selling the quartz for a third of the normal price.
Sidenote--I originally wanted concrete countertops, and I wanted to make them ourselves to keep the cost down. We did research and added up what it would cost for us to make concrete countertops, and it came to about $1000 for our kitchen. Concrete is great because you can put any temperature on it and can pretty much do anything to it without it ever getting hurt. However, it would have been a big project for newbie DIYers.
So when our realtor took us to this place to look at quartz and we found out it would only be about $200 different to get someone else to install quartz for us (including a new sink!), we jumped on it. I think I had about ten minutes to pick out a slab before we put down a deposit because of course, it was available on a first come first serve basis. Woohoo! That absolutely was worth the headache it would have taken to order concrete supplies and make them ourselves.
Okay so look--there's the drywalled ceiling. We had to paint that after it was all dry,
which was a new experience for me.
The lights were off for several days as all these things happened, which made painting after work hours not easy, especially since it was still winter and got dark early. It also put pressure on me to pick out a new light fixture already! I knew if we put up the old ones "for now" they would be there for way too darn long.
Enter the new dining light fixture. I wanted something that wouldn't block the light from the window, because that would affect the kitchen also. The whole point of taking down that fake bookcase was also for more light and openness.
This particular light is actually from Lowe's in the outdoor section.
Oh and look! We painted it "Cup of Cocoa" by Behr. Hurray for the stripes being gone!
And check out that perfectly drywalled and newly painted white ceiling! Progress!
Drywalling the ceiling made a monster mess of the newly tiled and grouted floors (this is after our tile guy wiped it down three times!), so we tried to clean it up a bit more.
Check out these poor wood floors.
SO much better!
By this point, the new faucet had also been installed. I got it at a place called Southeastern Salvage here, and it was a steal at $53. Plus if I ever get attacked while doing the dishes, that sprayer is heavy enough to knock someone out. :)
Whew! So the ceiling was now done, the painting was done, the floors were done, the sink, faucet, and disposal were now installed, and the lights were installed.
Pics I don't have--the finished painting in the kitchen, and the light installed in the kitchen. You'll see those in the next post, but I just forgot to take them at this stage in the game.
Next up, MOVING DAY!
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