It's a Kitchen Again!

After a week of my BIL working hard, I am back to having a functional kitchen!!! I am SO happy to not be doing dishes in the bathtub anymore. As far as esthetics are concerned,  the only changes to the kitchen you see are a new sink and faucet. We reused the counter top and cabinet fronts. The base cabinet boxes are completely rebuilt, out of much stronger stuff than the originals, all the plumbing under the sink and in the walls has been completely redone, and the holes that had to made in the concrete wall have all all been shored up and made safe. Hopefully it will be a LONG time before we have any more plumbing issues in the kitchen.

Next up is the upstairs hallway bathroom, which right now is down to wall studs. All the demolition is finished in there, and now the reconstruction begins in there.

Life has been pretty chaotic around here with all the repairs and renovations going on. I haven't had the time to figure out a layout for DS the Younger's wedding quilt, so the bits of sewing time I've had, I've been working on blocks for an Aussie quilt for DS the Elder instead. Stephanie, my dear friend in Canberra, helped me acquire some Aussie fabric, because DS the Elder loved his time there a few years ago. Most of the fabrics are large print, so I needed a block with big pieces. I chose the Garden Path block, which is an easy block with large enough pieces to showcase larger prints. I have about 34 blocks done, but only a couple of those pressed.

Not too much else going on, which is a good thing! I'm not sure I could handle much else ;-)

My Sister is a Winner!

I come from a pretty creative family. My dad did a lot of woodworking, my mom is an amazing seamstress, plus she knits, crochets, and used to make wedding cakes on the side. My oldest sister does lots of crafts. She quilts, does several papercrafts, doll-making, along with many other things, but one of her passions is cake decorating. She entered the Hershey contest for 2013, and this was her entry.

Isn't that an awesome chocolate castle, all decorated for Christmas? I just found out she won the contest, and I am so proud of her! Great job, Sis!

I'm definitely now winning any prizes these days. Remember a few weeks ago I said I had water seeping up through my kitchen floor? It's time to tackle that problem now, so here is my life at present.

This wall normally has cabinets, a kitchen sink, a refrigerator...yeah, not now.

Like the mold that was growing under the cabinets? The manufacturer of our cabinets went out of business, so they need to be rebuilt, since we're not up for replacing all the cabinets in the kitchen. Our kitchen was remodeled in 2006, and I certainly wasn't planning on a big redo now.

I did manage to finish my Chimney and Cornerstone blocks this week. There is quite a pile of them, since I needed 60 of them.

I stuck a few blocks on the sewing room floor just to see how it would look, and I'm liking it. I hope DS the Younger and future DDIL do too!

I have a lot to be thankful for during my chaos. My BIL is in town and can do the repairs we need, which is awesome! I'd much rather pay him and not have to worry about whether or not it's done right. I have several meals prepared and in the freezer, which will feed my family while I have no water in the kitchen. Hopefully I can keep my mind on my blessings while I'm doing the dishes in the bathtub tonight!

Round One

This hasn't been a great week for sewing, nor did I expect it to be. In little bits of time, I did get the first round onto the Chimney and Cornerstone blocks for DS the Younger's wedding quilt. These blocks need three rounds outside the hour glass blocks. Tomorrow I should have some decent sewing time, and I'd LOVE to get round two finished. That may be a bit too ambitious for one day, considering there are 60 blocks and I'm bound to be interrupted.

 

It's been a while since I posted, so I'm not even sure I said I finished the star blocks for that quilt.

There has been lots of house stuff going one here, with major stuff starting next week. Our Christmas flood, with water coming up through the floor tiles in the kitchen has resulted in quite a bit of water damage. Fortunately for us, my BIL is coming to town, with all of his tools, so we are hiring him to do the repairs. While he's here, we're going to have him remodel at least one bathroom, maybe two if we have enough money. He remodeled two of our bathrooms simultaneously when we lived in Missouri (which is where he lives), so it would be kind of funny if we had him remodel two at once again. Our current house has three bathrooms, but one has already been remodeled since we lived here. At least here I know we'll have one functional bathroom, as long as the water is on.

Remodeling the bathrooms was not really on my radar, though they are past due needing to be done. DH and I have been doing some preliminary shopping, with me trying to decide what I want. I have been horribly indecisive, until today when I finally chose paint colors, decided on vanities, and have a good idea of what I want. I'm waiting to choose faucets until my BIL is here, though I have chosen which finish I want where. He knows which brands are best, and I trust his judgement, so I'll just tell him which finish I want, and have him show me my best options.

I'm not sure how much of the kitchen is going to be disrupted yet. I know I'll have some time with no kitchen sink, and possibly time with no laundry. I hate my kitchen sink, it is an almond color and it stains horribly and is impossible to keep clean. I'm switching to stainless steel and replacing the faucet while the damaged cabinets are being torn out and rebuilt. Since the sink has to be moved anyway, it's the perfect time to replace it.

DH and I were supposed to be going away next week, but with the house repairs that isn't going to happen. We are funneling as much money as we can into the house repairs. The house repairs are making us cut back in other areas too. I had planned to send DS the Younger's wedding quilt out for quilting, but with all the repair bills that's no longer an option. With the house being torn up and redone, and DD#3 starting back to college in a week, so even more time watching the twins, I'll have to be creative about finding enough time to finish that wedding quilt in time! Where there's a will, there's a way, right?

DD#3 is off both school and work next week, but DH is off too, all because we were supposed to be leaving town. There is a possibility I may have quite a bit of sewing time next week, but not necessarily. I'll just see how things go.

The twins turn 3 on Sunday, the 12th, but I'm cheating and ordering pizza for their party. I'll make some cupcakes, and do a little decorating, but overall I'm taking the easy way out. Too much on my plate right now to put a huge effort into a party they aren't likely to remember anyway.