Ruff ....err rather, rough inspections

I think Lauren’s been listening to too much DMX. Anyways, we just had all three inspections over the past two weeks and I really don't believe it could have gone any better.  You always hear those horror stories about how the city inspectors are terrible and will make you do all these things that aren't necessary making the whole process unbearable. HOWEVER, that has been the complete opposite of what we have had to deal with. 

The framing inspection went perfect and we passed without any issues. Now mind you WE HADN'T BUILT THE MUDROOM YET. So how could we have passed a framing inspection without all the framing completed. Well, I think it helped the inspector was polish and our contractor and him got along very well :)  The electrical inspection also went very well and the inspector was impressed with how well electrical was installed so we passed without any issues.  The plumbing inspection on the other hand didn't go that great. He passed everything above ground but he didn't want to pass the plumbing in the basement that was sub grade. I blame this completely on the previous owners and their idea of "Renovation". The very thoughtful former owners thought it would be a good idea to install regular PVC under the basement slab and connect directly to the city's sewer line. They seemed to ignore the Chicago code of having cast iron below grade. If they did not want to use cast iron then they should have at least used ABS not PVC below grade (which is still incorrect in Chicago but works in other cities). So the inspector decided to make us rip up all of the plumbing below grade and install cast iron. This wouldn't have been a problem if we were planning on doing it right away but we were trying to see if we could do that piece of work later in order to save a bit of money, but now it needs to be done to pass the plumbing inspection.  Just another couple $$grand$$ added to the budget ::::major eye roll:::

Rough Electrical and Plumbing

BIG MILESTONE HIT!!! All of the rough in electrical and plumbing has been finished (except the mudroom) so we have requested to have rough inspections from the city. Rough inspections include plumbing, electrical, and framing. Lets hope we pass inspections without the mud room actually being built yet. Fingers crossed.

Picture taken while standing in the Sunroom (Great Room)

Picture taken while standing in the kitchen and you can see we do not have a mudroom built yet. Its still too cold and the ground is too frozen to pour footers.

Kitchen

2nd Floor Full Bath

Can lights in the kitchen

#MommaNeedsAKitchen

The day has finally come...we have ordered kitchen cabinets. HALLELUJAH!

It's been 3 long years without a kitchen, yes...that wasn't a typo...THREE years without a kitchen, and I couldn't be more excited to be rejoining civilization.  I can finally stop with the #mommaneedsakitchen tags because momma WILL have a kitchen!

For every decision we've had to make for this reno thus far, I have thought, "Now THIS has to be the hardest decision we've had to make," but this time I'm serious! the kitchen decisions pretty much take the cake for toughest choices to ever have to make.  There's just so much that goes into it, like the layout and workflow, your appliances, the design, the budget, etc. Don't get me wrong, it's definitely a lot of fun designing a kitchen, but on the flip side, there's just so much pressure! I'm constantly thinking, "What if I don't like this when its installed?" It all seems so permanent. Sure, nothing's really permanent and you can always redo something, but there's too much money going into this to change it up in a few years...or like ever, so yeah it is pretty permanent and every day I'm second guessing myself.

So after months of researching appliances, looking at houzz.com for inspiration and working with a designer to determine functionality, we have come up with the layout below :)

We decided to work with Cabinet Style Studio on Milwaukee and Helen has been extremely helpful. The cabinets will be solid wood made by Fieldstone Cabinetry and will be marshmallow white with the island being a dark brown color called Java. 

The dark grey areas above are where new walls are going in.