What A Difference Less Than A Week Makes!

We’re already up to this, people:

I know! It’s unbelievable! Our contractor, for the most part, has been great and gotten a lot done. Even though yesterday was Saturday, his electrical crew was here for several hours continuing the large project of moving all the electrical lines around for new lighting, the power for the large island, and the new pantry. I think he’s coming back tomorrow to finish up.

Also, the roof and siding were completed, and so now from the outside it doesn’t look like an eyesore! WOOT!

Our contractor hopes to begin sheetrocking by Tuesday. In the meantime, Denis and I continue our purchasing frenzy. This weekend we bought a ceiling fan for the eating area, the pendant lights for the large island, and last night we hunted and found the light to go outside near the sliding doors.

Once sheetrocking is done we’ll know the exact dimensions of the new walk-in pantry and will be able to begin space planning. By our calculations, our old pantry had 14.5 sq ft of space – and we used ALL of it (our old pantry was packed). Our new pantry will have about 20 sq ft of space, and we will also have the ability to go HIGHER with shelving than our old pantry, so there’s a huge potential for storage there. We just need to figure out what we want to do. We love the idea of a big formal pantry with shelves, cabinets, countertops, baskets, wine racks and all sorts of customized doodads. Our budget doesn’t allow for all that. Our contractor covered the cost of plain wood shelves in his quote, but if we want the extras, we’ll need to provide them. I’ve been coming in under budget throughout this construction project, so there IS money there to spend on a fancy pantry, but another part of me wants to keep that money and use it after the addition is done – on repairing the now destroyed backyard, or replacing a portion of our back fence that is wobbly and falling apart, or upgrading our boring concrete patio into something more architectural.

We’re on track for getting the flooring laid out by the end of this week, and the cabinets are due to arrive the following Monday or Tuesday. So. Exciting.

We’re getting used to the chaos. The kids don’t care at all (naturally), but it has been weird to sit and watch TV in the TV room while your kitchen table is acting as a coffee table because you had nowhere else to put it during construction. But I know it won’t be much longer – maybe another month? – and we’ll be back to normal. Denis and I agreed that once the project is completely done we’re going to hire a cleaner to come do a deep cleaning of the entire house – not just the downstairs, but the WHOLE HOUSE. That’s going to be a great day. *lol*