Our new, downsized and outside temporary kitchen:

We are now 5 months into this project.  The new (and original) hardwood floors were to start getting sanded and finished yesterday (September 17).  However, we didn’t see the hardwood floor installer until last Friday, for the first time.  When we told him we had expected finishing to start on the next Monday, he told us that when he started in this business about 25 years ago, his mentor told him point blank that this business is based totally on lies; no one knows when anything will happen.  Our experience certainly bears this out.  He also said that all he could tell us for sure is that he is on our job now, and he will show up every day until the floors are installed and finished.  Hallelujah!  We are satisfied with that!

Last Sunday, our incredibly awesome and strong SIL (son-in-law) helped Hubby move everything remaining on the main floor of our home either into storage or upstairs.  We hired pool table pros to dis-assemble and store our pool table – that’s it wrapped in plastic under our outside TV.

The main floor is now completely empty and ready for floor installation, lacing in (new to old), and then finishing.Here you can see the new beams, the removal of old columns, the original hard wood floors, all looking across from the living room.This view is from the dining room (pool table room for us) across toward the living room and door to the side porch, with Hubby modeling.

The walls in the remodeled portion of the main floor happened amazingly fast.  Once the paint color was added, we could begin to see our vision take shape.This picture is too dark to show our cabinet colors, and the cabinet faces are all wrong anyway.  We still are not sure what that fix will be.  However, the new window/door unit is shown here and it is fabulous.  You can’t tell, but we have 3 colors of cabinetry and I didn’t want to unveil the colors until countertops and lighting were in to show the complete effect, but the picture doesn’t show the colors anyway, and we want to have a bunch of in progress pictures, so here it is.This is from the kitchen looking across the new family room, with more cabinetry on the left, and the fireplace on the right.  The fireplace was not to be sheet rocked, but covered with some kind of backer board to support the rock that will cover the entire thing.  The rock installer will have to remove the painted sheet rock to start his rock installation.  You can see the wall/ceiling paint color in this picture.  We love it.  The white crown molding that will go around beams and at the top of the walls will be lovely.Here you can see the pocket doors that separate the new family room from the living room.  The wall to the left of the pocket doors will host the TV which will be centered under the beam and live directly across from the fireplace.  The location of the TV was a central decision in this whole project, just speaking the truth.

The next progress photos will likely be related to our hardwood floors.  We considered a different flooring option for the new part of the main floor, but decided one way we could tie in the new and the old would be by continuing the original hardwood floor into the new area.  We did not want thresholds of any kind, so that means lacing in the old and new:This is a chore.  This picture shows the original floor as it approaches the pocket doors from the living room side.  It is ready for the new floor boards that will carry into the new family room.

Timing?  Who knows?  It’s all lies.  Hopefully we will be able to host Thanksgiving in our new kitchen and family room.  Meantime, we feel pretty proud of spending our first Memphis summer largely outside on our side porch.  What better way to acclimate?  Speaking of acclimating, we’ve been noticing that Oregon temps now in mid-September show highs in the 60’s and 70’s and lows in the 40’s.  It’s still summer here in Memphis – highs mostly still in the 90’s (and still humid) and lows still mostly in the 70’s.  Our windows closed soundly in May, and remain firmly closed.

Next up, pictures of finished hardwood floors.  Timing?  Who knows.