Sunday 22 May 2011

Bromley Kitchen - Emma's Kitchen Project Part1

We bought our first home five years and eight months ago, it was always intended to be our first step on the ladder and we envisiaged moving to a more long term home within two years but life got in the way!
Why do we still have our petite 2up2down? because we decided to get married, have babies and things such as my redundancy have popped up and messed with our plan!

When we bought the house, it came with an awful 80's kitchen (and other delights such as mouldy carpets, horsehair plaster crumbling off the walls and granny decor), a teeny tiny kitchen with a very narrow bathroom stuck on the end. Since then, we have rejigged the upstairs to now include a small but lovely bathroom, meaning that the downstairs one can go!

First thing we did was sit down and discuss if we should turn the old downstairs bathroom into a utility room (Pro's being that the house desperately needs storage space, the noise of the washer will be out of the way and there would be somewhere to air and dry clothes etc...) or if we should knock it down and make our little kitchen big enough to fit a small table - all this time we've been eating our meals from fold up tables in the living room which I really hate - especially when I'm trying to teach my little man table manners! We went with a bigger kitchen which means a wall to be removed and ceiling to be replaced! - Messy!

We realised that emptying the kitchen would mean everything going in our living room - leaving no room for living! also, the dirt and lack of kitchen/water/electrics would mean stopping somewhere else - que the lovely inlaws! We started by neatly storing everything behind the sofa, on the bay window and infront of the dvd cabinet - but it didn't take long for total takeover!

Unpacking our old kitchen also meant we discovered that for people who don't drink very much, there was actually a rather large amount of alcohol hidden at the back of cupboards, ontop of shelves and in the back of the fridge! - Our old fridge BTW was donated to a local charity - The Hope Foundation.

We don't have very much in the way of kitchen things because we had been living with the too small and dated kitchen - but we do have a few treasured items - mostly wedding gifts such as my our kitchenaid food processor and blender (I'm in need of a kitchenaid mixer to complete my our set!) . We were amazed at just how much our kitchen kit took over the living room! I love the kitchenaid blog for tips and reviews!

We decided to start by clearing the kitchen all the way back to brick, removing the wall and ceiling and trying to create as empty a shell as possible. So we booked a skip and started the dirty work!

We hung a dust sheet over the doorway to the living room to try and minimise dust - but the entire house is covered in one very thick layer of dirt! and some horrors were uncovered - in the ceiling our builder found evidence of an old mouse nest! when we first bought the house, there was a mouse problem which we sorted quickly (and I'm sad to say the humane traps didn't work as well as the other types) I think it came from holes which we filled in which lead to our next door neighbours who have cats. Cat food next door means a constant food source from a safe distance!

Here are the photos for part1 - Part2 coming soon!









5 comments:

  1. Good luck with the building work! I hate the process but the result makes it all worth it in the end.
    The first part of you post made me chuckle as we are also still in the house that was our first step on the ladder, 2 up 2 down which we thought would be sold within the first 2 years. 5 yrs down the line and two kids later and we are still here :)
    Found your blog via Britmums blog hop, nice to meet you!

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  2. Thank you for your reply - I wonder how many of us get stuck in our first homes when we start families?!

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  3. Ooh, this is exciting. I love renovations. We had our kitchen done a few years ago and it is messy but definitely worth it!

    CJ xx

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  4. hi we had a whole house renovation 2 years ago and it was a nightmare at the time but sooo worthwhile. Found you via a blog hop and will be following. hope you get a chance to pop to mine at muminmeltdown.blogspot.com

    Thanks x

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  5. "I wonder how many of us get stuck in our first homes when we start families?!"

    *Puts hand up*

    We have great intentions of moving from our 3 up 3 down (the 3 up is 2 and a box room really, mirrored downstairs by a tiny downstairs bathroom + thankfully a large kitchen/diner and a largish lounge) , but with 4 kids, 2 of whom are now in secondary, we figure we'll probably have to move upwards and outwards rather than away...once they're in school you really can't move too far!

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Thank you for your comments

Emma x