The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Shortly after our last remodeling adventure there was a small kitchen mishap. I was cleaning up in the basement when all of a sudden I heard a "drip, drip" sound. I quickly discovered that it was coming from the general direction of the ceiling on the side of the basement where Mr. SweetHome parks his hoo-ride. We tried turning off the water to everything we could think of in that location, but no luck. So, after a phone call to the plumber and a wait of about three days (as this was immediately after all the tornadoes in our area, of course) he came by and within five minutes he determined that there was a leak in the waste plumbing. Eeeeeyeeeew. Even grosser? Said leak was caused by some bonehead who decided that when he was hanging the pantry shelves that, miraculously, there must be two studs about 4 inches apart. Yeah...well, that second stud? PVC waste pipe. The leak wasn't apparent before now because the screws had finally corroded enough that water was just now steadily dripping out. Unfortunately not enough to make any damage or telltale signs that we would have caught on the inspection, but enough that the drywall around the pipe was a soft mildewy mess. This also caused my husband to exclaim loudly and multiple times, "that's our $hit, Focker!" If you haven't seen that movie, I can't even begin to explain the parallel.  

Here it is. The hole. Also you can see the sweet wire shelves that ran across the entire length of the pantry. You could fit a lot of stuff in the pantry, but organizing and making it look nice? Not so much. There is a reason that grocery stores (and sane people) don't use these. Nothing stands up the right way and it is a waking nightmare for those of us who are OCD about organization.

A full-length shot. So you can appreciate the entire vista. Also, this is only half of the pantry space. In total it's about ten feet long with double french doors. I didn't take any pics of the kitchen once we got the pantry cleaned out because even I have my limits. Suffice to say that it, too, was awful beyond imagining. Piles of cereal boxes, canned goods and dog food everywhere. Of course Little Boo loved it, and pretty much spent a long weekend traipsing into and out of the kitchen with a box or bag of whatever he felt like munching on.

So once we realized that neither our home warranty or homeowner's insurance was going to pay for the drywall replacement and shelving replacement, I went into designer mode. I had wanted to re-do the pantry, but it was way down on the list. At least, it had been until we had a hole in our wall and Frosted Flakes balanced on top of the coffee machine. But before design we had to demo. Mr. SH and I knocked out 150 square feet of drywall while J-Bird was at school and Little Boo was down for his afternoon nap. Other that working out, it was probably my most productive naptime ever.

Oh, and I couldn't resist- especially since we have had more than our fair share of impromptu remodeling and repair lately, heh heh heh:

But finally the demo was done and it was time to replace the walls we tore down. I may have mentioned in the past that the Mister, wonderful as he is, is just not the handiest of fellows. Luckily, my BFF's hubby is very much so, and arrived at our house bright and early on Saturday morning with all his power tools and a promise that we would be ready to paint and install the pantry system by Sunday night. And we were! His only request? Homemade risotto, a polish and wax of his darling bride's Mom-mobile, and the occasional wine break (he's not much of a beer drinker, but then again, neither am I). I was only too happy to oblige with the risotto and vino, and the Mister, who is quite handy when it comes to car maintenance and detailing, took care of the rest.

Too bad all our contractors don't work this way!
Anyhoo, we got the final sanding and mudding done on Sunday morning and spent the afternoon sunning ourselves at the pool with the kiddos. Sunday evening and into the night we primed and painted, and by Monday afternoon the pantry system was up.

 Here's one side all finished and stocked.

And here is the other side. I need to add some shelves to the rest of that wall space, but was thinking about wine storage or something like it. Not sure yet. But the deep freeze fits perfectly in the space and I am looking forward to having it in the kitchen- so much easier than tromping up and down the basement steps to get hamburger meat all the time.

And in case you were wondering we did paint the pantry in the same green that we used on the laundry room. It is such a fun and happy color and I think the space really pops with the green background.

Phew! I am pooped after all of our remodeling adventures as of late. Hopefully this will be it for a while...

XO

SweetHome