Our Kitchen: Granite Install (the unofficial after)

We can now proudly say that we have a kitchen with GRANITE!! Just remember (as mentioned in my last post), Thursday morning our kitchen looked like this:  

I took the day off from work so I could be there to see the magic happen. It was pretty neat to see our granite pull up on a trailer (wish I would have thought to snap a pic, sorry!). The installers came in and immediately went to work on demolition of the old white counters. Because I wanted to be out of the way, me and Dixie headed back to hang out in the office. With all of the ruckus we were hearing, I was kind of nervous.

When the ruckus stopped for a minute, I  could tell that the installers took a break or had left the kitchen so I snuck out to take a peek. Our kitchen was counter-less!

Dixie and I went back in the office for a while, watched some TV, surfed the net, pinned on Pinterest, Facebook stalked and checked in on work email. I was talking to my Mom, she told me to go out and take a picture of the granite on the trailer before it goes in… and when I walked out I saw the first piece had already been installed!

Not too much longer, I came back out again to see that most of the granite was installed and the sink was set.

Another cool thing, my husband is a Big Green Egg enthusiast. Haven’t heard of a Big Green Egg? It’s a ceramic, charcoal cooker that can grill, smoke and bake. Anyways, B actually built a table for his BGE and we worked a deal with our granite installer to get a piece to top his table. It’s a different slab of granite than ours, but think it looks great!

As the afternoon progressed, so did the backsplash. I should mention that there was one “uh-oh” moment when the installer looked up at me, holding up a piece of tile and asks if I’m sure this is the ivory travertine I wanted because it looks a little darker. After examining and re-examining against the sample I was going off of, it was the right tile (PHEW!)  – just looked darker because the old, white backsplash was SO white compared to the ivory travertine.

Here we are as the grout was drying. The sink and faucet still needed work and the new outlet covers are TBD.

And for comparison take a look at this side-by-side of the before and progress!

Once I get re-situated, decorated, outlet covers installed and a few other updated details complete I’ll take an official, after pic to post!



Our Kitchen: The Before (Naked)

The granite installer comes..... TOMORROW! So, I just officially made our kitchen counters look naked. Sunday afternoon I worked to organize the top drawers, clean out a few cabinets, clear out all the supplies from under the sink and cleared off most of the counters except for the necesseties. 

After clearning off our Keurig coffee machine, utensil holder, paper towel holder, catch-all bowls and taking off all of the switch plates this is what's left.

Looks a little stark, huh?

The white trash compactor has never been touched in this house. By us or the previous owners. In fact, the user manual is still sitting inside the bin. B and I have talked about two different options for replacing this - wine refrigerator or pull-out trash can (I think trash can would be more practical, B thinks wine fridge would be cooler). What are your thoughts?

I never would have guessed I'd be so nervous about getting granite. Maybe it's just excitement that has me stirred up? Wish us luck tomorrow, can't wait to share "the after"!

Our Kitchen: The Before (Decorated)

The official count down to granite is..... 3 DAYS!! Since this granite deal is about to get real, I wanted to share The Before (Decorated) pictures of our kitchen. 

This is our kitchen looking it's Sunday best.

Literally, I spent Sunday morning cleaning and making our kitchen look spotless and in tact as it would be if we were having company. I realized that the only "current' pictures I have of our kitchen were from Christmas time - and as it should be no surprise, there was Christmas decor everywhere - so I wanted pictures just a normal, June day with no holiday/seasonal decor to be seen. 

  

Of course, you probably noticed that Lime Green and Mackenzie-Childs are "my thing". Aside from all of the cute green and checker decor, let me introduce you to 1995. Light woodwork, white counter-tops, formerly brass hardware and florescent lighting.

In reality, I don't think our kitchen is THAT bad. We just can't wait to get rid of the white, 'stains easy', 'see every crumb', 'hard to keep white' counter-tops and back-splash.  

And see this cute little corner nook with the lamp? It will also be getting 'granitized' - thanks to my Mom for the great idea!  

I heard that our granite installer was cutting our granite today... in preparation for Thursday's install!

Count down to granite: 3 DAYS!!! Eeeeek!

Said "Yes" to a Granite Slab

If you follow me on Instagram (@McSwann) you may have seen Saturday's exciting news that I finally said “Yes” to a Granite slab!

 

 

Brandon hit this situation dead-on…. picking out a slab of granite is like picking out a wedding gown. You’re stuck with the decision for life; it’s a non-returnable, customized, expensive investment and someday, someone else will look at pictures and judge your selection. No pressure.

 

So, after 4 weeks of looking at and “trying on” a dozen different slabs with our cabinet door, we made a choice. We ended up with Santa Cecilia Classic (you can see some of the other color options in my last post).

 

 

Knowing that B and I were going Granite "shopping" on Saturday, I called Thursday morning to check current stock of the different colors I liked at both Granite Suppliers (GS #1 & GS #2). GS #1 had Santa Cecilia Classic in stock but in order to guarantee that we could see it Saturday was to place it on hold. So, I did. On Saturday, we went to GS#2 first; walked around, saw a slab of Napoli that we liked but it was already spoken for… so we left empty handed. Then we made our way to GS #1 and I was nervous; nervous we wouldn’t find anything or I would hate the slabs that were on hold in my name.

 

Turned out, GS #1 had a few options I liked… but I liked the slabs with my name already on them best. It must have been meant to be. This particular cut of SCC had hints of brown in addition to black, which is what I wanted. Some SCC slabs had black only and seemed to look too green.

 

 

Because I’m not the best decision maker, I had to walk up and down and look at all the granite selections again. And came right back to the slab with my name. At that point, B took a step back from the slab, looked at me studying the slab and said…. Are you ready to say “Yes” to this slab? And I said, “Yes”.

 

From there, we knocked out the rest of the “to be picked out” list in about 15 minutes. I already knew what I wanted by this point. 

 

Edge cut for the granite? Straight. Done. 

 

 

Back-splash? Ivory, tumbled Travertine 3x6 subway tiles. Done.

 

Sink? 60/40 Granite Composite in Cafe Brown.  Done.

 

Then to Lowe’s to pick out a faucet....

 

 

 

Done.

 

Now we wait for the install …. which in just 10 days we will be saying goodbye to 1995 and hello to 2013. The updated kitchen we've wanted since 2009. EEK! (this also, makes me nervous. The indecisive me, sure hopes I’m good with those decisions. And hopes it all turns out well!)

Granite Problems

Who knew picking out slabs of Granite could be so hard?!

We're going on week 4 and still haven't claimed a slab. Yes, I'm indecisive, but picking granite is a BIG deal (espeically when you've waited for this for almost 4 years)!

The good news is, it's not completely my fault. So here's an update on where we are in the process....

Week #1 - Granite installer comes, brings some samples (2 pictured below, both variations of Santa Cecilia), measures and gives an estimate, tells us where to pick out slabs, sink and backsplash.

Keep in mind that we currently have white counter tops, white tile flooring and light woodwork in our kitchen (hello 1995!).

The to-be picked out list:

2 slabs of 3cm, Level 1 Granite

Granite Edge Selection

35 sqft Backsplash

1 Sink

1 Faucet

Inspiration Pictures:

 

Weekend #1 - "You can look, but none of these slabs will be yours"

Visit Granite Supplier #1, they're out of 3cm Santa Cecilia slabs, but was able to browse their 2cm selections.

  

Also found Santa Rita in 3cm but only had 1 slab available and wouldn't have anymore in stock for at least a month.

  

Week #2 - "Place it on hold and check to see if your installer can pull it off"

*Granite Supplier #1 (GS #1) is still out of 3cm Santa Cecilia and Santa Rita

Granite Supplier #2 (GS #2) has slabs in the colors I like in the thickness we want, but those particular cuts are U-G-L-Y. This slab of Santa Cecilia looks like a hairy man's back with some rust spots - no one wants to cook on that!

  

However, I did find another granite color I like, Napoli....

  

BUT there are two big, BIG blobs in the slab. The associate called them "blue accents that would give character", I called them "blobs that I don't want in my kitchen". The only way around the blobs is literally to hope the installer could cut around the blobs. So, I left with pictures to send our installer to see if he could pull it off.

  

Now that there is a 3rd color in the mix, I called GS #1 to see if they had any 3cm Napoli in stock, because if they do, maybe their slabs would be blob-less! As luck would have it, they did have Napoli in stock, but in a place where there isn't access to look during the weekends. I was told to "Try next week during the week".

  

*Granite installer says he "could probably cut around the blobs". No offense to the installer, but I'm not really comfortable with the word, "PROBABLY" when it comes to my forever granite decision.

Week #3 -  "Too muddy to look"

I called GS #1 to check the status of Santa Cecilia & Santa Rita slabs and to see if I could go out to look at their Napoli slabs. They're still out and it's too muddy to see Napoli..... Fail.

Week #4 - crossing our fingers that Saturday B and I can both go look at slabs. Thus far, I'm the only one who's been slab shopping.... can't wait for him to see how overwhelming it can be :).

Wish us luck on our continued Granite Slab Search this week; I will keep you posted on our progress!