Kitchen cabinets finally on the way

This past week we got vinyl floor covering installed in the master and guest bathrooms, but the real story is the staining and finishing of the kitchen cabinets. Below is a shot of the new vinyl in the master bathroom.

The vanity, with sinks and medicine cabinets will go on the left wall; the tub/shower unit, on the right. I showed the guest bathroom base cabinet and medicine cabinet in the last blog.

The main feature of this week's blog is the finishing of the kitchen cabinets, a process that is going on in Paul Pringle's workshop. Here Paul and Manita are looking over the stained doors and drawer fronts, while various cabinets are stacked all over the workshop and outside. Below is a picture of the cabinet doors outside and inside in the sun. In the upper right of the picture below right is a cabinet with three drawers showing. They will later have finished front panels attached to them (see below). To the left of that cabinet is a large one that will surround the refrigerator.

The flash brings out the warmer colors above, while the lack of flash in the next picture of the same scene reveals cooler, darker tones. Both pictures show off the grain of the red and white oak.

These panels and the pieces in the other pictures below have all received two coats of clear finish in addition to the stain. The picture below shows off more of the grain and a knot in one of the panels that will be fastened to the front of drawers like those shown above.

Finally, the pictures below show off the oak grain in more door panels and on the fronts of three special drawers that will run diagonally into the northwest corner of the kitchen. Notice in the right picture how Paul has pieced the two parts of the drawer fronts together with matching grain.

On Monday, Paul will start assembling cabinets, moving them over to our new house, and installing them in the kitchen. By Wednesday he hopes to have at least the base cabinets together, so that the granite people can measure for countertops to cover the cabinets and the island in the middle of the room. By Halloween we hope that all the cabinets and the countertops will be installed and appliances ready to use, because we are due to move in shortly after that.

Before that can happen, however, we also need to get the remaining lights installed, along with the garage door and all plumbing fixtures, and get the remaining painting done. We must also tie up loose ends that are too numerous to mention. We will probably move in with many things yet to be done, but maybe by Thanksgiving we'll be basically moved into our new house. We'll let you know.  --oc