Kitchen demolition in Juggling with Hedgehogs

Well, it’s started. And OMG. I knew it was all going to be stripped out etc, but I don’t think I was prepared at all for how it would look once it was.

We’re knocking the kitchen into an office that’s adjacent to it. The office has a fireplace, which is also being removed to make the room fully rectangular, and then the ceiling will be replaced. The floor is coming up, being screeded and then tiled. Walls will be gyproced, and painted.

We’re on day 3 now, and it only took the guys a single day to get both the walls and the fireplace out. I’m very impressed with them so far. Minimal fuss or mess - lots of noise obviously - and a very neat removal of all the hardcore.

This is the office and fireplace:

This is the adjoining kitchen wall being removed

Fireplace removal:

View up the chimney:

How it looked at the end of Monday:

How it looked last night:

We have a long way to go. Our electrician/plumber/gas engineer/all round good egg is coming today to start his section of the works, which involves re-siting a radiator, putting in plumbing and gas pipes and setting up the electrical wiring for all the appliances and lighting.

The kitchen itself is allegedly being delivered on Friday. We’ll be storing everything downstairs in our office while Paul figures out how to install everything. Then we’ll be arranging for IKEA to come and measure for the bespoke worktops. Exciting times…but I hate the upheaval and I really just want it finished.

We’ll get there. Slowly slowly.

Ryan is visiting us - he arrived on Sunday night. He instantly fell in love with Milo.

He dog sat for us last night while we had our Portuguese lesson. Milo thinks Ryan is one big playground. Ryan is happy for Milo to eat his toes, climg all over him and generally have fun.

This was Milo this morning with his dental chew:

As you can see, he’s grown a fair bit. He’s had his second jab. We have to wait a month for him to have the rabies one, and then he can go outside. Until then, he’s a house dog. He’s got his chip as well - boy did he cry! Poor little thing. We were not popular for taking him to the vet!

Ryan is keeping busy while he’s here. I’ve got him doing tons of work in the garden. We needed our drive widened, and a bush removed so that we can turn the cars round easier. He spent yesterday afternoon doing that, and then our builder called his mate with a tractor to come and pull the bush out of the ground. It’s a rather lovely flowering quince, so it’s being replanted elsewhere as I type.

This will eventually be concreted…

So much to do here.