How the Grinch (Nearly) Stole Thanksgiving

It was that close.

Thanksgiving traditionally comes on a Thursday, and by Monday morning we still didn't have a working kitchen. No stove; no dishwasher; no washer or dryer in the laundry room. Oh, and no bathroom, either.

Things were looking bleak.


The local restaurants may be our only choice. Dinner at Denny's, anyone?

With superhuman effort, three skinny workers hauled all the appliances out of the garage and up the back stairs to the second floor. No mean feat, that. Coincidentally, I wasn't here to see it (grin).

But that was last week. Now all the hardware is sitting in the middle of the kitchen, unplugged and only vaguely near their destined places. The official "appliance installer" had bailed out sometime last week with no explanation.

Sunday I muscled the fridge into place and leveled it. That's one down. Tuesday the plumber came and adjusted the gas line behind the stove. That's two. He also moved the gas hookup for the dryer, and plumbed the washer (and the dryer, which has a cold-water connection). Somewhere in there the leak under the kitchen sink got fixed and the dishwasher got plumbed in. By Wednesday morning it was looking... maybe... almost... possible.

There are no knobs on any of the drawers, so we made do with blue painter's tape. And we had no lights except for a couple in the vent hood, so... we're cooking early today! Turkey in the oven, veggies on the stove, rolls in the warmer, and pies from across the street. We're cooking now.

Cari and David both made it from their respective homes. It smells like a real Thanksgiving.

Paint No Stopping Us Now

Before the kitchen is entirely finished, we (meaning Kathy) wanted to paint. It's easier to paint before everything's installed because you don't have to reach behind all the appliances and you don't have to worry about dripping on your new cabinets.

On the other hand, it can be risky to start painting before the construction is complete because it might get bashed up. We went for the latter option.

The kitchen is green and the laundry room is yellow. (We haven't decided on the bathroom yet.) We chose green for the kitchen because it's always been green before. When we took out three layers of flooring (cf.) they were all green. And the hand-painted cabinets were green. Finally, there's green in the stained-glass window over the sink.


The same rationale led us to choose yellow for the laundry room. It had a green floor like the kitchen, but the glass in the door is yellow and blue. We eliminated blue as a choice, so it was yellow by default. Counting the contrasting ceilings, that's four colors of paint. Plus primer. We went through a lot of brushes and rollers.

Our Baby Shower

We haven't had a shower in over three months.

By that I mean, the bathroom shower was demolished a long time ago, and the replacement shower isn't done yet. Since it was the only shower in the house, we've had no shower at all since... June, I think.

We do have an ancient clawfoot bathtub upstairs, and for the first month or so we just sat in the tub and poured water over our heads with a big plastic cup. That got old after awhile (imagine!) so we sprung for the "telephone-style" shower installation you see here.

We still crouch in the tub, but at least now we can spray real water over our heads instead of dipping the big cup. It's progress. We've advanced from Medieval technology to Victorian.

Piles o' Tiles

I call this one still life with tile.

These aren't very interesting photos, but they provide a snapshot (hah!) of where things stand right now. The bathroom is stripped bare, the kitchen is crowded with appliances, nothing works, and there are no lights. Basically, it's a minefield of hard edges and square corners.

We drove up to Gilroy to get all the tile. Twice, because they gave us the wrong quantities. Now it's all sitting in piles awaiting the tile guy.

We don't know when the appliances will get installed. Thanksgiving is coming and we can't even walk through the kitchen, never mind cooking. And we're tired of going to the laundromat.