Did I mention we are undergoing a kitchen renovation? Well, it has been disrupting our daily lives now for three weeks, and I cannot remember the last time I had a home cooked meal. Takeaway food really sucks.
Here is a shot of the gutted kitchen from last Tuesday.
It is now double the size of what it was, because the old one was very pokey, and only one person could work in there at a time. It is now big enough for me to make cheese and preserves at one end, and for Kim to bake bread at the other end.
So in this post, after three weeks of no kitchen, I am going to pen a list of the things I really do miss that we normally do in our kitchen. After all, the kitchen is the centre of the home in more ways than just its location and is an essential part of living simply.
- Fresh home baked bread
- Home cooking
- Roast chicken on a Sunday
- Omelettes from my free range hen eggs and herbs from the garden
- Making Cheese
- Eating Cheese
- Making Hot Chilli Chutney
- Eating breakfast at home
- Warm biscuits, straight off the tray
- Washing the dishes in the kitchen sink
- Making a cup of tea in the kitchen
- Making winter stews in the pressure cooker
- Showing the kids how to make simple meals
- Cooking with my own freshly grown produce.
Now here is the list of things that I will not miss.
- Walking around the outside of the house to get the milk due to drying floor tiles
- Washing dishes up in the laundry
- Ironing clothes anywhere the iron board will fit
- Living in my study for days at an end
- Living in an unheated home because of holes in the ceiling
- Wearing 6 layers of clothing because we can’t turn the heating on
- Not having any motivation because of the disruption
- Loosing my sense of belonging
- Dust everywhere
- Sneezing constantly
- Crap that workmen leave laying around at the end of the day
- Having to clean up after workmen who trash my garden
- Carrying dogs around because no one is allowed on the floor tiles
- Having to put off friends visiting because of the mess
To finish on a positive note here are the things that I am thankful for during the renovation;
- The love of a good woman
- Great kids who managed to find alternate living arrangements while chaos ensued
- Good friends who offer to take us in for the odd evening when it gets unliveable
- Good friends to take Ben 10 for a sleep over with his mate.
- Having the cash to pay for all of the work and not go into debt because of it
- Having the common sense to not go overboard with expensive items
- Being able to source sustainably sourced timber for the doors and frames
- Replacing all old appliances with energy efficient ones to reduce our power bill
- Being able to Freecycle all the old appliances to those who really need them
- To be about 80% of the way through the renovation
- To have really nice builders, electricians, cabinet makers and tilers who listen to our requests
- Having a home to renovate
- And to still be married at the end of it!
Rock on next weekend. It should be very close to being finished and I will be able to make cheese again on Sunday! Hooray!
good luck, I feel for you all. We went 9 weeks without our kitchen that was a nightmare but we survived.
That last line about still being married,is the clincher, Gavin. We went through a renovation of our first house,15 yrs. ago, then a total house building after our first house burned, and my husband said the same thing. Most folks don’t get through those types of things with their marriage intact.We did, and so will you.It was all worth it,too.We are both retired now and loving it, together.
@ Sue
My goodness, 9 weeks! and here I am missing it after only 3! You must have a lot of patients.
@ sawn61
I dare say that Kim and I will also survive even though Kim gave the cabinet maker a blast today for shoddy workmanship. We will make it no problems at all.
Gav
“Takeaway food really sucks.” Amen, brother. We had our kitchen remodeled about three years ago. Nothing major, just a slight reconfiguration and new cabinets. Once it was done, I refused to eat out for a month. You don’t realize how much you use something, until you don’t have it. Good luck. Hang in there.
You know we expect LOTS of photos when it is done, Gavin! 🙂
One reason we looked to buy a house with the major parts (kitchen and bathrooms) already renovated!!
Good luck with the rest…
The best bit is at least the Kitchen is now bigger than mine…. was gobsmacked that my kitchen was bigger than yours when I went down to visit early in the year and that you have a house… I only have a mobile home… didn’t make sense, all’s well that ends well.
xxxxx
You mentioned the other day about jackhammering out the tiles… our tiles are concreted in and when we redid our kitchen (on our own) we left the current ones in (cause there was none under the old cupboards)
But it would be quite easy to make do around the cupboards and such, so now I am tempted to instead of tiling on top, to jackhammer out and retile then… Thanks (or not!) for the thoughts…
Now that’s hard going! I’m finding Sydney too cold at night atm so I don’t know how you’ve managed to survive without frostbite!
Looking forward to hearing more about the ‘eco’ aspects of your reno as I am currently trying to work out how to improve our kitchen. There don’t seem to be any eco-friendly kitchen suppliers in Sydney at all 🙁