End Game with Kitchen Connection

At long last, everything that has to do with the Kitchen Connection is finished except haggling over final payment.

In Summary:

The contract said 42 working days, which was May 15th more or less.
After a number of delays, due largely to mistakes make by the Kitchen Connection, a hard completion date of June 1st was promised. I did not have working sinks until the start of June 22nd, which I had to organize myself. The granite counter tops were not installed to the original plan specifications until the end of August, and not finished until mid-September (delaying the installation of the range and hood until September 15th). This caused me to incur additional installation expense and the aggravation of a number of other parties, who had to cancel scheduled installation appointments and store the goods while waiting for the counters to be completed.

Thus, I did not have a working kitchen for four and a half months longer than the original estimate, and four months after the revised estimate you gave me (June 1st). Since there was not a working kitchen, it was not saleable or rentable, and I was forced to cancel a number of major social events including a wedding reception.

Additionally, during the entire three month period, I had to product manage the process, requiring many phone calls to either the Kitchen Connection or its subcontractors every week, my being on site for most of the work done during this period due to mistakes made in previous construction, extensive negotiating with Kitchen Connection’s subcontractors, all of which totaled many hours of my time, not to mention domestic aggravation.

Kitchen

Yes, I know it has been a long time, well, because, not to put too fine a point on it, nothing has happened in a long time.
But at last today the log jam may have cleared.
- Granite arrived and hopefully got installed today. Will know in a couple of hours.
- Tuesday the cabinetry gets its final work through - handles get put on, sinks get connected, rest of the moulding gets attached, appliances get put back.
- Tuesday or Wednesday range and hood get installed.
Dare I say Thursday it might, might be finished?? Which would be good because Friday morning its off to the Wilds of New Jersey.

Tonight and tomorrow, everything goes back into the kitchen, the furniture gets moved back, tomorrow the carpets get cleaned.
Sunday the guest rooms get cleaned.

Weekend spent cleaning house, painting interior of the bar cabinets, moving stuff around.

House got vacuumed for the first time in months.

Cleaned the Refrigerator!!! Threw out all the food from the previous millennium, scrubbed the interior with bleach, took out all the shelves and bins and ran cleaned them. Looks like new (on the inside) have to take handles off (soak in bleach) and turn door around.

Made a wonderful dinner from the Low Glycemic cookbook (one of our favourites) which we had on both Saturday and Sunday.

Stephanie went sailing on Sunday -I worked on the house. So far yet to go.

I am still hopeful that all the various trades people will all show up Tuesday morning and get everything running.

Tonight and Wednesday - clean out guest rooms.

This week in construction

First, a Kitchen update because I know everyone is just as fascinated as I am.

The floor, I got a phone report in, is now 80% complete (one small section left because a few pieces of tile got broken when fixing the not level bits) which means appliances can be installed next week!

The electrician arrived this morning and will be wiring up all sorts of stuff - more power to the upstairs, the hot tub, the garage, the wine fridge. I spent two nights moving stuff out of the living room so that he would have room to work. Amazingly clear room now. This cost me a Thursday night with my urban tribe, not a great trade.

Stephanie found on Google what I was unable to find, a wine cellar that would fit on the sides of the stairs so at last those can be ordered. We also picked out faucets.

I finally got all the clutter out of my bedroom and the bathroom mostly de-cluttered (we have been watching home improvement shows about how to reorganize and redecorate, almost as bad as cooking shows - but its helping with the motivation.

The new allergy meds are doing wonders, the runny nose and sneezing and cough are almost all gone. Go go Fluticasone!

This weekend we are back up to Tahoe for the last of ski season. I'm giving it a 50/50 shot as to our actually putting on skis. Snowpack is at 49% of normal, and Stephanie is not expressing much motivation for skiing on slush. My knees would be happier if we didn't. But the ski cabin must be cleaned out.

Another Kitchen Update

Since it is one of the main topics of conversation (at home and abroad) here's the latest on the Kitchen Project:
The following have arrived or will be delivered on demand: The sinks and the range. We still have to order: the faucets. (yea! that's it!)
The floor was installed, but the workmanship was iffy - the tiles were so uneven that we noticed the unevenness just walking across them in our shoes.
I am afraid the installer will have to redo over half the tiles, and since there are less than 2,500 sq ft of this tile left in the world, I hope he is able to get enough tile. I am not entirely happy about this...
The last of the cabinet work is ready to go, we are mostly waiting for the tile to be finished. In theory, there is a new cabinet being made to replace the one that is too small.
The electrician is ready to work on the rest of the stuff on Friday - pending above being finished.
The granite is waiting on the cabinet work, so that it can be measured and then there is a two week (estimated) wait for it to be cut and installed.

In related news Stephanie had a cleaning fit, and my room got vacuumed within an inch of its life. I don't blame her - I don't want to go home the the disaster mess either. Tonight I will steam clean the bathroom The allergies are getting bad enough that sometimes it sounds like I have consumption.

Kitchen update

Well the kitchen is fully demoshed, plumber comes money to move a gas line and see if I can put a sink in the bar, possibly not.
This weekend we are going skiing, its about 70+ here, I'm taking the Hawaiian shirts and my shorts.

Here are the photos from the last dinner party, with scenes from the old kitchen, and the first round of removal.

Fully demolished pictures to follow...

Kitchen