Crazy about Cabinets

Great news all around about our house! Last I wrote we were heading to the hearing for our BS $500 fine from the city. While we didn't get off scot-free, it was lessened to $100. It could have been worse, but it's still annoying to pay that when it's not our fault. We talked a big game about contacting the Title Agency to pay it, but so far we have not. The Judge hurried through all of the hearings so she could attend the Ravens rally!!

But in other news, we picked out our cabinets! As I mentioned before, we had an inspiration kitchen that changed our minds from an off-white more rustic cabinet, to a more modern style white cabinet. We ended up going with a "shaker style" cabinet, that in its most basic format looks like this:

Pretty basic, but provides a clean, modern look.

Mike and I know everything there is to know about cabinets now. We exhausted ourselves learning about cabinets, and getting not two, not three, not four, but FIVE quotes for cabinets (six if you include our walk-through Ikea before deciding getting a quote wasn't worth it). Seems like a bit excessive, but every meeting we walked away from we weren't 100% sold. And interestingly enough, the last place we visited was Home Depot, and I think that one will be the winner! We will order on Thursday, since they said our brand is going to start running a promotion that day. It's one of our most expensive purchases, so I'm happy that we were smart about our choice.

So some basic cabinet knowledge, for those who don't know. We ended up choosing a "full overlay" style, which means that there is no space between the two cabinet doors. For example, these are NOT full overlay (they are called 2" overlay):


See the wood between the two doors?

We think the full overlay are nicer to look at, and they save space without having wood that separates out the two spaces. It's easier to get a long tray in a full overlay cabinet. There are also other features to consider: soft close for both doors and drawers (which we got), plywood construction vs. MDF vs. themofoil (I think ours is a mix of plywood and MDF), glaze vs. no glaze (we didn't get a glaze, but for some reason WHITE is a premium color with an upgrade charge! How is something void of color an upgrade?), and of course just the overall look. The brand we went with is American Woodmark.

I'm really happy with our choice. I feel like if we'd gone with any of our first four quotes, there was a part of each of those cabinets that we weren't too happy with. Either they had an overlay, or not soft-close doors, or felt cheap. Or they were just way over our budget!

Our next big decision - and this one is a doozy - is tile. We are tiling SO much - three full bathrooms, basement floor, front entrance, and the backsplash. We haven't really started looking, so we have a lot of work to do!

**UPDATE TO PREVIOUS POST** - The reason our basement dig-out felt so luxurious is because there will be 8" of concrete poured on top of the dig-out. So when we were there, it was almost 9'. In reality, it'll be a little more than 8' tall. Oh well. Still exciting!

 

 



Luxurious!

The digging out of the basement is underway and really cool! When we went down to the basement and got a sense of the ceiling height, I exclaimed "This feels luxurious!" Meanwhile, this is what we were looking at:

Mike's a lucky guy, since I think this feels luxurious! :)

This is how they get the dirt out of the house.

We didn't realize how many steps would be needed to get into the basement bedroom - that's high up!

Oh, hello! Thank you for working on a Saturday!

It was really cool to see this process in action. Definitely got us excited!

We've also met with a few cabinet people - that is our next big decision! I think we're looking at a "shaker style" cabinet, which is a nice, clean look. The inspiration kitchen on my previous post is shaker style. It's pretty cool to meet with cabinet people - they work within a CAD program and can produce images of your kitchen design pretty quickly. Even though I work with architects and know sort of how it works, it's still neat to see it applied to our own house! This is the most current design:

Love the large island with seating, and the window above the sink!

Even though we aren't chefs and don't really NEED it, I love the look of the hood.

The island is super cool - wine cooler on the left, microwave in the middle, garbage/recycling on the right.

The microwave's location has definitely been an issue, since we want the hood. There is a cool microwave that is actually a drawer, so it's really hidden. BUT they are super-expensive (like more than double a regular microwave), so this was the alternative we came up with. It's not ideal, but we don't microwave a ton so it'll be fine. It's all about compromise!

Tomorrow morning is a big day - we have a 9:00 hearing to fight the $500 fine that we got for "not registering our house as a vacant" - whatever that means. Wish us luck! It's coincidentally at the same time as the Ravens Super Bowl parade, so downtown will be INSANE! Hopefully there will be a Ray Lewis/Joe Flacco/T-Sizzle/Ray Rice/Boldin/Ngata/Torrey/etc sighting...I'll take seeing any of the Ravens! Love them all! We also have a meeting with the contractor to decide the final layout of the basement. Exciting!