Kitchen redux

The remodel of the kitchen is finally and visibly underway.  We really started several weeks ago with planning and design with Kim Annable, and Jeff Wooster has been building our cabinets in his workshop.  Kim also scraped all the old nasty finish off the pantry; with a new, flat finish, the beautiful cherry wood is really going to glow.  And we picked out new Thermador appliances several weeks ago from Home Appliance:  gas cooktop, electric convection oven, microwave, and warming drawer.

This is how the kitchen looked up to yesterday evening.  Kind of sad that our "before" pictures were our "after" pictures less than a year ago.  We didn't think we'd need to remodel so soon...this picture of Sunny and me was taken just last January and I can see I have my construction clothes on.

But yesterday we emptied all of the cabinets and today Brian and Christopher began demolition.  It's a big mess and has entailed removing the dishwasher, range, and microwave, so no more cooking for awhile.

 Demolition will continue for another couple of days, then the new cabinets and cabinet doors will be installed on Thursday.  On Friday we should be able to get Brian from Solid Source to come out and template our granite countertops.  I think the new appliances will be installed on the 12th but we should be able to use the old ones until then once demolition is done. 

Choosing the granite was a process in and of itself.  We were sent to Mont Granite to choose from I don't know how many colors of granite; I had no idea there was such an amazing diversity.  We finally narrowed it down to four then made our final decision on Saturday.  This is what we chose:

It's called "Fire Bordeaux" - is it gorgeous or what?   I'd like to take a piece of whatever's left over and put it on a wall somewhere.

Future egglayers of the B&F

Picked up 3 new baby Buckeyes on Tuesday from Meyer Hatchery.  All survived the first night (not the case the last time) so I think we're home free for awhile, knock wood.  As always, they're just as cute as they can be.

In other chicken news, our 2 older hens, Chipmunk and Mimique, are molting and so all egg-laying is off for now.  They look awful.  Our other Buckeye, who is about 5-1/2 months now, has yet to lay her first egg but it should be soon.  In the meantime, fortunately, we're able to buy free-range organic eggs from our friend Kim at Wild Goose Gardens just outside of town.

Five wood-burning - er, coal-burning - fireplaces

We had a chimney sweep in last week to have a look at our five fireplaces and possibly clean and repair them so that they'd be ready for winter.  We were surprised, and initially dismayed, to learn that they are actually coal-burning fireplaces.  However, it turns out that this is a good thing.

Dining room fireplace

First of all, if they were wood-burning they would be totally unusable as they are not lined.  Going up the center of the house, as they do, would present a huge risk in terms of embers flying up the chimney and setting the house on fire.  Something tells me our insurance company wouldn't pay for that.

However, since they are coal-burning, they do not have the creosote build-up of wood that is the chief cause of chimney fires.  Furthermore, coal does not throw off sparks and embers that could ignite a fire.  Coal is clean, burns hotter and more evenly than wood, keeps going longer.


Granted, our fires won't have the smell and sound of a wood fire.  On the other hand, they'll actually heat the house, and they're authentic to the period.  Now we just have to figure out where to find coal and how to light it (by Nov. 18).  Just what we need:  another project.

Oh, and what do we do with the ton of firewood in our backyard...?

Entryway fireplace