If you want comments about the toe control, maybe your post should indicate that's what you are talking about. Three months without a kitchen is not that unusual -- I expected you to be looking for planning advise.

I've seen these commercially and they're pretty cool! I've never seen one residentially, so I think this is brilliant.

Yes, three months. You're not allowed to whine yet. I'm since 2005.
Head on over to the What I Accomplished Today thread and you might feel better.

byzantine:

Are you doing this yourself or are you paying a contractor to take this long?

The OP is sharing something that makes them happy while they wait. She's putting on a good attitude. Why squash it - she's doing great!

I'm one week into a kitchen makeover and I try to enjoy something new that happens every day. I am photographing progress for each day someone is here working.

The foot pedal sounds great. I don't have one and never thought of that for my kitchen.

"The OP is sharing something that makes them happy while they wait. She's putting on a good attitude. Why squash it - she's doing great!"

Yes. Thank you.

Not squashing it, just pointing out that the title didn't reflect the nature of the post. Generally not a good way to get responses.

I'm sure it's exciting for the little milestones. I'm almost 5 months in and it is challenging trying to see the positive when you want your life back. What brand is the hands-free? I've only heard of the tapmaster so waiting for that to be installed. I'm told the tapmaster will still work with the side spray so I hope they are correct.

Sorry, but I just don't get these 3-month and 5-month kitchen remodeling projects. Maybe I'll quit the repair business and use my license to install kitchens in a month, 6-weeks tops.

My wife could rip out front end alignment machines, bust up the concrete, place new, install new front end alignment machines, test and calibrate, and turn the key over to General Motors over the two-week Christmas shutdown.

And these guys can't get a residential kitchen completed in 3 months? What am I missing here?

This post was edited by Trebruchet on Mon, May 26, 14 at 12:50

"What am I missing here?"

Could it be that you are missing the point of the thread, which is "trying to stay positive"?

A month or six-weeks seems doable provided that everything is picked out ahead of time, there are no issues with materials, there are no mistakes or do-overs from subs, no surprises, no changing of minds, etc. I would imagine there are a million reasons why a kitchen remodel would drag on for months or even longer. My delays started with the tear out which opened up a can of worms we hadn't expected or planned for, requiring more money, more time, more planning, an engineer, and multiple additional visits to the city for approvals as well as additional visits from the inspector. We also put in a few things that we liked well enough on paper, but not so much in reality, and those things had to be removed and other things ordered to take their place. I was actually quite happy with the slow-moving time table because it allowed me to make changes at will without the pressure of a GC needing to get done so he could move on to the next project.

Byzantine, it has been six months without a kitchen and a few more to go for us. The bathroom sink is the kitchen sink and we wouldn't be able to easily set up the nifty foot pedals like you have. To be fair, we have been living through a major house addition and the kitchen hasn't even been started yet. We are just finishing with all the rough mechanicals, waiting for final inspections, then drywalling begins. I'm so sick of living in a construction zone and I hope that once drywall is in, things will really pick up.

To be positive, I have to say I have been enjoying the prepared meals that we get from a number of places here in town. And we started grilling out over the weekend which will increase our meal options.

Trebuchet , I don't think you are missing anything. In my area of Michigan, all building is taking much longer than expected, something I have to keep reminding myself of. We just came out of the worst winter on record which started just as the roughing in began on our addition. The contractors kept being pulled away for emergencies constantly. Getting inspections from the city is taking twice as long because of cuts in budget and staff. Waiting a week or so is pretty common.

In the past year, our economy has really picked up. All builders are overloaded right. I count 3 other major house additions going on just with a block of my house. Add to that when the economy tanked in Mich, which was hit harder than any other state, many skilled tradesmen moved away. They are not coming back and there is a shortage of good carpenters, plumbers, electricians and others to do all the work. DH and I are not doing most of this work ourselves, his lack of time and I have no desire to, so we have to rely on availability of the contractors. If we didn't have to wait for contractors and the inspectors & if we would have had the mild winter like we have had the past 3 or 4 years, everything would be done by now. It is just our rotten luck, I guess!

Looks like surgical scrub sink foot pedals. I would love to have this in my kitchen.

You will have to let us know how you like it.

What's a front end alignment machine?

jellytoast:

I have to respectfully disagree. When you want agreement or commiseration, go talk to your mom. When you want an honest opinion whether you like it or not, this seems to be the place. If I think your backsplash clashes with your countertop and you've asked, I'm going to tell you. It's what real friends do.

snookums2:

If the front wheels of a vehicle aren't "aligned", it will create excessive tire wear and possible shimmying. That's why this has to happen just before cars leave the plant. The machine my wife's company installed performed this operation.

To answer my own question, I believe there is a lack of a sense of urgency with most residential remodeling. When GM shuts down for Christmas, they expect to be making cars immediately when they get back. They will brook no excuses about inspectors, workers, fire, rain, hail or anything else. As a contractor, if you expect to ever do another GM job as long as you're in business, you'll have them aligning front ends after shutdown, no excuses.

Not so much with residential remodeling. Your customer is doing dishes in the tub for another month? Big deal. You'll still be in business after her job anyway, because all your competitors do the same thing.

I'm driving about 2 hours one way to get to repair an oxidized rod in a countertop tomorrow. It will be done in one day. No excuses.

This post was edited by Trebruchet on Mon, May 26, 14 at 18:25

"In the past year, our economy has really picked up. All builders are overloaded right. I count 3 other major house additions going on just with a block of my house. Add to that when the economy tanked in Mich, which was hit harder than any other state, many skilled tradesmen moved away. They are not coming back and there is a shortage of good carpenters, plumbers, electricians and others to do all the work."

aamichz5:

Count me in the group that left, although I just did 3 hours of online continuing education to keep my Michigan Residential Builder's license. If Michigan gets desperate enough to raise rates high enough I'd consider leaving Florida, at least for the summer.

Trebruchet: There's more going on here than just a kitchen remodel. We've had to repair the foundation, remove the chimney from the attic down to the basement, replace the furnace and hot water heater. There was a lot of structural amendment that needed to be done, as well. We lost a few days to very bad weather -- been here 9 years and this is the first time we've had more than one snow day.

Having said all that, it is still taking longer than we had hoped. :-)

In hindsight, I would not have had them gut the kitchen at the same time they started the other demo work (chimney, furnace and water heater), but that's spilled milk. More positive: we're going to be in Scotland for two weeks in June. Maybe it will all be magically finished when we return!

red_lover: indeed I will.

I actually go to my mom when I want an honest opinion whether I like it or not :-)

Our projects always seem to take forever. Part of it is that we do almost everything DIY and 2 more than full time jobs get in the way of our desired schedule. The other part is that when you open walls in a 50 year old house (or this one anyway) there are all sorts of surprises that need to be fixed, which stalls the project.

Byzantine - those foot pedals are very cool. Good luck with your project!

This post was edited by juddgirl2 on Mon, May 26, 14 at 22:50

Nifty foot pedals! Your cabinets and floors look good too!

I'm almost three months into a small kitchen remodel only. The issue here is DIYing. Dh does the tricky stuff and he already works too hard at his "day job". So there have been slow phases. So far we have contracted out the flooring and the counters and those were done in a timely manner. We will hire out fabricating the cabinet fronts but not finishing or installing them.

It has helped soooo much that dh has kept the kitchen semi functional by having the range/sink/dishwasher temporarily hooked up most of the time - bonus of DIY I guess. I have done lots of relatively complicated cooking and my 8 year old daughter has even done her baking projects.

Our kitchen sink and appliances have been out for 8 months. It's still an empty room at this point; flooring is in but it's unfinished because I had to get rid of the flooring guy. Whatever schedule he works to is completely in his head and we actually need work to get accomplished. It's a shame; I've seen his work and it looks nice.

To the OP, if you have pedals and cabinets in, it looks like you're close to finishing at least!

Trebruchet, you would be welcomed back with open arms if you ever decide to come back to Michigan, even part of the year. I don't know what the current rates are since we chose to go with a builder that we knew was not the cheapest, but does a good job of making sure her subs do things correctly and makes them fix things that aren't right. But the building biz is booming here in A2 so I expect the going rate is going up.

Byzantine, I envy you your upcoming Scotland trip. That alone would help me to be positive during construction. You just keep your eye on that prize and be sure to report back.

Mags438: It's made by Chicago Faucet. Sorry I missed you before.

aamichz5: All the spaces we're renting in Scotland will have working kitchens. One even has a Belling stove.

Quartz counters go in the day we are leaving. I've been having nightmares about some construction mishap causing us to miss our flight. We'll be gone for 2 weeks and wouldn't it just be nice to come home to a working sink, dishwasher and central air? We're pushing for it.

In amongst all of my fidgety-hustling to get ready for vacation, I'm supposed to measure for tile. Since I've not done that before, I'm pretty sure I'm going to screw it up.