Navy Kitchen and a Hilti Angel

A few significant things have happened over the last week. If we had been this productive every week since lockdown started we would nearly be in by now!

The Kitchen arrived! This room has changed the most and I really can't believe how far we have come (even with so much still to do!) When we bought the house it was split into 2 rooms - a galley style kitchen and the back living room. We have knocked down the dividing wall, created a completely new floor, removed the chimney stack and created a huge hole in the back wall supported by steels, ready for our bifold. It took me no time at all to write that list, but actually doing it has taken us 9 months!

The back living room showing the chimney breast we have now removed.

The original kitchen. We knocked down the wall on the left to create the open plan space.

The open plan space after we had knocked the wall through, but before we had removed and replaced the floor.

But on Monday, following my last coat of paint to the walls and ceilings, Jon and Dad took delivery of the new kitchen cabinets. We still need to actually fit these and order the worktops and inserts, but finally we can get a feel for how that side of the room is going to look. Thankfully, despite never seeing an example of it in real life, we both love the colour - Indigo Blue. It is dark, but I think it will be fine with a light oak floor and once we have decent lighting and natural light coming through the bifold. The additional blue hue in these photos is due to the tarpaulin currently covering the huge hole while we eagerly await the bifold's arrival.

The other huge difference is we now have attic stairs! Jon and his friend Aaron fitted them on Wednesday, which means I can finally get into the loft room as I was never brave enough to face the ladder gauntlet. Testing them out for the first time was a little nerve-wracking, but they have already carried some significant weight since, so I am assuming they are completely safe. I am so happy I keep running up and down them, just because I can!

It's such a huge space up there. We haven't decided yet whether the loft room will be our bedroom or not and so are going to wait until the 4 velux's are in to see how it feels. For now, it has already become our dumping ground. It's nice to be able to store things up there and create space to work in the downstairs rooms.

Final words.

I don't think I have ever swept or hoovered as much in my life since working on this project! It feels like a constant battle with dust and as soon as I am happy an area is clear, Jon decides to use his mitre saw. But during this process I have discovered something so magical, it almost makes the job fun...almost. Her name is Hilti. Being bagless means this amazing creature can not only gobble up dust and sawdust super efficiently, she can also handle disused nails and large chunks of rubble. Jon says she is very expensive, but absolutely worth every penny! I think I have gone a bit delusional from dust inhalation today...

Example only. Not our actual Angel!