Kitchen Reno - Part 5

The wife is happy: we bought a dishwasher. We ordered it from Sears ($644 including delivery) on Monday, and it will be delivered next Tuesday (when the cabinets are being installed). There isn’t much selection when it comes to 18” dishwashers (the standard size is 24” wide). You can basically choose your colour. We went to the Brick on Sunday, just to check around. So why is it they hump your leg when you don’t want to be bothered, but when you have a questions, no one is around. Then we get pawned off to the old guy who “doesn’t know” if they have an 18” dishwasher, so proceeds to surf Brick.com to check. Thanks but no. That is the second time we’ve asked a salesperson this week if they have something in stock, and they proceed to surf the interwebs for 5 minutes.

We picked up the flooring, TUNDRA white, last Sunday. We got all 7 packages (about 150 sq.ft.) and the underlay in the car. It was “free”; we used the gift cards we got when we purchased our kitchen cabinets. Otherwise, it would have been about $300.

We also finally went through all the boxes that contain our kitchen, and everything was there. (The wife actually told this to our contractor on the phone, and he was surprised; he said most people don’t do that.)

The plumber comes tomorrow and is going to rough-in the dishwasher, in addition to installing valves. The electrician was out yesterday to rough in the dishwasher. I didn’t realize we need a permit to do this; an inspector from the city is coming out on Monday to inspect the work. The electrician was $380, which included at $120 city permit.

The wife is having a hard time finding someone to paint and/or tile. One lady was supposed to come out last night at 7pm. Finally at 8pm, we left a message on her phone to not bother. The guy that came out earlier in the week gave us a price of $600 to paint four walls, and $1200 to tile the back splash. Seriously. We may be doing this ourselves.

Kitchen Reno - Part 4 - 100 Easy Pieces

IKEA delivered our kitchen on Tuesday. They called us a few weeks ago saying they had received it at the Calgary warehouse. They will store it up to 10 days, but after that they start charging you something like $20 per day.

We were surprised at how little stuff there is. Our whole new kitchen (not including new flooring, baseboards, and dishwasher) is in that room. It weighs 1000 lbs. And we have 7 days to confirm that everything was delivered. I started last night and I guess there is more stuff than I thought.

Next week and the countdown is on. The plumber comes next week to install shut-off valves on our sink. This will allow our contractor to install our sink when he installs our cabinets. The only concern I have is our water lines come in from the bottom of the cabinet (not from the back, like most sinks). We’ll have to drill holes in the sink cabinet bottom shelf and then lower it down overtop of the lines. We will also have the plumber get things ready for the dishwasher, which we will order this weekend.

The wife has a contact for a painter for our kitchen. After the bathroom, I don’t think she will ever paint again. We are going to try and match the blue on our IKEA dishes. It is a robin’s egg, or maybe powder, blue. The only problem we have is the front room and kitchen share a wall, so there isn’t an obvious place to stop painting. I think we’ve decided just to stop it at the edge of a doorway.

The last remaining question we have is whether to strip our floor before we put the new one down. There are two layers of vinyl floor in the kitchen, but one doesn’t go underneath the cabinets. When the new flooring is laid, there may be a bump near the new cabinets.

Kitchen Reno - Part 3

The contractor came over last Wednesday. He built all the showrooms at the Ikea store in Calgary (which gives me confidence). He quickly measured up our kitchen and gave us some suggestions. He agreed to do our flooring install, but doesn’t do plumbing, electrical (for the dishwasher hookup), painting, or tiling. He does haul all the crap away, which is awesome.

We booked our install for Aug. 31 through Sept. 2 (3 days). He figures it will only take 2 days but put another in to be safe. He noticed we don’t have valves on our sink faucet lines. He said if we have a plumber come in and put the valves in, he can install our sink. We’ll need the plumber to come in the next day so he can attach the drain (and dishwasher).

We got confirmation of our “pre-measure” from the contractor the next day. We need this to bring to Ikea so they can process our order. On Friday, we went to Ikea to actually buy everything.

They have discontinued the SOLAR white wall cabinet doors (which sucks because they don’t require hardware), but they do have the SOLAR beech base cabinet doors. We chose APPLÅD instead, which look exactly the same. The girl helping us was great, even when she screwed up and gave us LIDINGÖ instead of APPLÅD wall cabinet doors. (I think it was because her hyperactive coworker kept talking to her while she was trying to enter our order: DUDE, you can show her how far a pencil goes up your nose later!) Karen discovered this before we left the store but after we paid. So we had to go back upstairs, get a new order with the right doors, go to returns and have them void the transaction, and then have them ring in our new order. It wasn’t too bad; it gave us a chance to pay for home delivery.

So the total bill was $2800 and we got $400 in Ikea gift cards (which should cover the flooring). The only question left is: where do you store 800 lbs of cabinets and countertops in our little home?

Kitchen Reno 2009 - Part 2

Another reason we've though about doing the kitchen reno now is we did the bathroom a few months ago and it wasn't totally terrible. Our bathroom looks nice and it only took a few days. The bathroom did cement the fact that we need someone else doing the kitchen reno, not us.

We went to the Ikea kitchen department two Sundays ago. The first women got us set up on a computer and we built the kitchen while we waited for the second (more knowledgeable) women to come over. Meanwhile, some crazy old dude (who I think worked there, or maybe picked up a blue and yellow shirt from the Thrift store just to f**k with us) came over and asked if we needed some help. I asked if the contractor who installed the kitchen could install the flooring too (and paint, etc.) "No, they just do the cabinets." Karen and I looked at each other. Of course, crazy Thrift store guy was wrong.

Ikea employs a company called Home-Work Contractor Referral who refers a contractor. The contractor (ours = Steve) comes out to the house (Steve = Wednesday) for an initial assessment (e.g., takes measurements), all for the low low price of $80. (Oh yes, my checkbook will be bloody after this.)

The total cost estimate varies from between $10K - $15K depending on whether the installation (i.e., labour) cost is 1x or 2x the material cost. (This is typically the way we look at costs for estimating for engineering jobs ... as a multiple of the material cost.)

Kitchen Reno 2009 - Part 1

So I thought I'd blog about our upcoming kitchen reno, as I've never gone through anything like this before, and it will be interesting to see the difference between my preconception and reality.

We've been thinking about this seriously for a year. Mainly since I broke our countertop using a hammer to get our old faucet out. Now there is a "rag" which covers the cracked area behind the faucet.

Our kitchen was white when we bought the house. A few years in we (and by we I mean Karen) painted it orange and brown. The cabinets have been painted so many times that the hardware is covered by many layers of paint and couldn't be removed.

The picture in this post is the layout I created using IKEA's kitchen planning software, which is surprisingly good. You can see our kitchen is small. And lacking a dishwasher, which is rapidly become the main reason for the reno.

Currently, the estimate for materials is $2795 (according to IKEA's software). We also plan on painting, putting in new flooring, and adding a new sink and dishwasher.

In subsequent posts, I'll include my total cost estimate and estimated schedule (I am an engineer), before and after pictures, how it was to deal with the contractor, and living without access to the kitchen (hello paper plates!!!)

500 gram diet

Losing weight is very simple: calories consumed less than calories burned . It is very difficult to burn calories, but very simple to consume them, so using exercise for weight loss is not useful (exercise for fitness is a good idea, of course).

The only way to figure out how many calories you have consumed is to weigh your food. Carbohydrates have between 4-5 calories per gram of food. So to lose weight, just weigh all your food and don't eat more than 500 grams of food per day. Eat whatever you want, but you'll soon find that sugary starchy foods will not fill you up. Fruits, vegetables, whole grains, protein, yogurt, etc. will keep you feeling full longer. No more looking up foods in tables or on websites. Just track the weight, and keep it below 500 g.

Notes:

• This does not include liquids. Never drink pop, juice, or alcohol, and you'll be fine.
• The recommended calorie consumption is 2700 for men and 2000 for women, but it depends on your weight and activity level.
• Protein has 4 calories/gram and fat has 9 calories/gram.

** It should be noted that I'm not a doctor nor do I have any training in this area. Also, I have never tried this diet, nor heard of anyone that has used it successfully. I'm mainly posting this so that if the next bestseller is a book called "The 500 Gram Diet", I can sue and then retire.

The Market Works

The free market works. How many loaves of bread to make next year? The government could do studies and create models, instruct bakers on how much to make, and then legislate and enforce the price. This was actually done in China and Russia. But, of course, they were disasters, with massive shortages or surpluses, and rife with corruption.

The alternative is let price determine what should be produced and who should produce it. If no one wants to buy SUVs, why should the government get involved? The free market is democratic, and the people have spoken. Giving GM, Ford, and Chrysler money is like giving money to Croc's when that strange foam shoe goes out of style. Tastes change and companies come and go.

Of course, the market can be brutal. It took a few years for the affordable housing crisis in Calgary to sort itself out and while the market works, people can suffer. This is where the government should be focusing. Put money into retraining and relocating people whose jobs were lost. Invest in new companies (and entrepreneurs) that need help getting started. This insane notion of "trickle-down" economics, that giving GM 15 billion will somehow trickle down to the workers, is an absolute waste. 12 months later, GM will still fail, but the money will be in the pockets of owners, managers, union leaders, etc. and the employees will still have to go find another job, go on EI, etc. Reckless spending on things we can't afford, using money we don't have (the magical "equity in your house"), is exactly the reason we're in this mess. You can't spend your way out of this, hoping that people start buying SUVs again. We need to save. We need to regroup and focus on working hard, creating products that people need.

This is all the stuff our grandparents knew. Hard work and prudent financial decisions is what make a country strong, not granite countertops and trips to Mexico.