Today was my son’s 19th birthday! I started this blog when he was just three and a half months old. Time flies….
I got a call at 8:15 this morning from our social worker, letting me know that the guardian ad litem (GAL) wanted to know if the twins are home today, and if so, she’s coming this morning. Of course the week before Pesach when there’s nothing else to do is a perfect time for a visit with minimal notice!
We had a lot of building materials still around the patio and yard that I wanted to clear away, so I asked that she come at noon.
It was good to get the materials cleaned up early in the day, and afterwards the teens cleaned upstairs for Pesach.
There’s been so much negativity and pressure associated with her visits, and the good thing about that is I’ve kind of run out of emotional energy to care much more about what she may complain about.
What I focused on instead was to presume good intention on her part. The social worker’s supervisor also came, and I noticed that the GAL also spoke with her in a critical way that sounds attacking. That was helpful for me to see, to realize that a lot of what has been said to me isn’t necessarily personal. By not taking taking her comments personally and with my looking for the good, I was able to view her in a more appreciative way than I’ve been able to in the past.
I don’t know what complaints may come out about this visit afterwards, but I felt it was a good visit. It felt fitting that she was the first visitor to see our new space, since it was when she came last time that it was clear to me how much I disliked people entering the house directly into the kitchen, no matter how neat it was. That was the final impetus I needed to make these changes.
I showed you pictures of the new kitchen setup; now here’s a picture of the new living room/dining room. It’s spackled but not yet painted (the hooks with the aprons hanging on it will be moved). I’ve taken pictures from a couple of angles to give you an idea of how the room looks overall.
This is where the main part of the kitchen with the sink was previously, before the wall behind it as well as the wall next to the stairs taken down. (Remember this was when we had started dissembling the kitchen and the overflowing counters weren’t reflective of how the kitchen usually looked.)
After the renovation, before painting. (The hooks and aprons will be taken down.)
Below is a picture taken from the kitchen – I included a corner of the fridge on the right so you can get an idea of the proximity of the two rooms to one another. The walls are somewhat staggered so the floor plan isn’t completely open, but it’s mostly open.
You can also see the area under the stairs has been closed in and has an access door. It needs a little more drywall work before being painted, but it’s very functional. The kids LOVE this little nook with the mini door – they haven’t gotten tired of playing in it yet.
We have exactly the same items in both the old and new kitchen and living room, but even though the floor space and furnishings are the same, both the kitchen and living room feel more spacious.
The below picture shows one benefit from changing things around. We have a large hallway that housed just the bookcases and isn’t a good use of space – too small to make another bedroom, too big for just a bookcase. By moving the living room to where it is now, the hallway is no longer wasted space and has become an extension of the living room.
I’m really, really pleased with the changes we’ve made. It feels like a new house to me! I am so happy with the increased feeling of space. When I was picturing what I wanted, I hoped it was going to be worth all of the effort, but I realized when I described what I wanted to do to the the plumber and electrician, and even my family members, none of them could visualize what we would gain by doing these renovations. I appreciate that my sons trusted my judgment and agreed to make the changes I asked them to make, even without being able to picture the improvement it would make to our home.
I’m sorry I didn’t think of taking a picture of the living room/dining room area before we moved the furniture out of the area and had and table out of that area and put some of the kitchen wall unit pieces there – it would be nice to show the difference.
But the supervisor (who was here for the last home visit less than four weeks ago) and the GAL were both visibly taken aback at how different everything looked from when they were last here. In a good way. 🙂
Though we’ve had tremendous progress on the kitchen, Wednesday evening the boys and I were all really tired and felt a bit disappointed that we hadn’t accomplished as much as we hoped to that day.
I have a tendency to want to get the tasks on my list done and then do the relaxing or enjoyable things. That’s fine on a normal day when there’s time for everything, but at times that there’s a huge amount of tasks to do, the time for rest doesn’t come and it can lead to burnout. I’m protective of myself from these tendencies, and despite the many things piled high in the kitchen waiting to be organized, when I woke up the next morning I resolved to begin the day with ample quiet and calm.
I headed to the chicken coop.
I take care of the chickens daily and sometimes spend long minutes in the coop, but almost never take time to sit down. Yesterday morning I pulled up a chair next to the brooder housing the week old chicks, and took out three chicks to hold.
It’s very relaxing being with chickens. It’s also very interesting watching them; someone coined the term ‘chicken tv’ and that’s accurate. The more I watch them, the more interesting it is to learn their behavior patterns and understand more of why the do what they do.
I spent over an hour sitting in the coop, and all three cute balls of fluff climbed right up from my lap to perch on my shoulder.
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Yesterday’s goal was to finish the kitchen. It was the last day the younger four kids would be in school before Pesach vacation began, and once they’re home, my ability to get things done goes down quite a bit.
There’s a lot of work that had to happen between the last post when big pieces were in place, to having all of the small details finished. Those details are what make a huge difference between an end result being merely functional or really nice.
The kitchen cabinets were adjusted so they will be higher for our tall family. The hanging cabinets are hung. The toekicks are installed.
The countertops are cut and installed.
The countertops were my biggest concern, since this isn’t work we have any experience with. It was dd28 who encouraged me about this – last year (thanks to our example), they put a new/used kitchen into their rental apartment, doing all of the work themselves. However, they also cut the countertop, something I had considered outside of our capacity in all of our past kitchen renovations. She told me it was easier than she expected, and it was her confidence that made me willing to try it.
Before the boys began working on the countertops, I asked them if they would be upset if they did the work, but then wasn’t happy with the result and wanted to get new countertops. They said it would be okay. Then, when they were taking off the first countertop from the island, something happened and for a long minute they thought it might have cracked. At that moment, it was really important to me that they not feel pressured about this project, and I told them that if something cracked or didn’t turn out well, it was okay – we would buy new countertops. (It didn’t crack.)
The countertops were a huge project that took two days. Though they all worked on it together, it was ds17 who made all of the cuts. Ds17 was exacting in his work and he did an amazing job, with an end result that was better than the best I hoped for.
When the plumber (who’s also a general handyman and has been for decades) came back to finish the final bit of work he had remaining , he was very impressed by how the countertops turned out. He told me he’s never tried to do work like that and exclaimed, “Your boys are really something, they really know how to do the work!”
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We began the kitchen on Monday morning and…drumroll….. Thursday night it was finished! I am super pleased with how the kitchen turned out; it was worth all of the effort.
I’ve reorganized all of the cabinets and cleaned them for Pesach; what’s left is to put away the odds and ends that don’t quite belong anywhere. It was a long and productive day for us all; today it will be so nice to do all of the cooking for Shabbos in our new kitchen.
Though there’s a bit less counter and cabinet space than I previously had, the space is much more usable. Everything feels bigger and better. We now have a spacious kitchen with plenty of workspace and storage space. It’s light and airy and has a beautiful view. I love it! In addition to other smaller advantages that I’m happy about, we achieved our two main goals: since it’s a mostly open floor plan with the living/dining area, it will be more comfortable when hosting guests, and finally, people won’t enter our house directly into our kitchen anymore!
The final detail remaining to do for the kitchen is to tile the backsplash. The tiles will be delivered on Monday, and I don’t want to push to get it done because there’s still plenty to do before Pesach. I also ordered some tiles to fill in the broken area on the floor of the old kitchen area where the plumbing pipes were. Unfortunately I couldn’t find a perfect match but since the entire first floor of our home has the same tiling and I’m not interested in retiling all of it, that small area won’t be ideal but it will be done. I do hope to tile that before Pesach.
I kept reminding myself and the boys, “Done is better than perfect!”
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We’re now turning our attention to finishing the area that the kitchen used to be in, that is now the living/dining room.
The staircase railing has been installed.
Here’s the progression of what that looked like:
Starting to take apart kitchen wall unitsWall units down, starting to take down wall next to stairsThe wall is downThe railing is finished!
The next big project is removing the wall tiling from the old kitchen area and repainting the walls.
The tile backsplash before
Once the cabinets were taken out and the tiles were off, an even bigger project remained- with the tiles gone, there was a broken thick layer of tile adhesive stuck to the wall. In order to paint, the wall would need to be spackled, but to spackled, all of that tile glue had to be chipped off with a drill. This was a tremendous amount of work, all of which was done by ds15. Once the adhesive was off, the walls looked quite beat up.
Here half of the area has the first layer of spackle. Note the table piled with all of the tools and hardware in use.
Ds15 has done all of this project and did a lot of the spackling before he and ds18 switched places. Ds18 had been working on building the chicken coop while ds17 finished the last part of the kitchen, so ds15 went out to finish the coop while ds18 did more spackling. The wall is going to need several layers of spackle before it will be smooth and can be painted; each layer has to dry and be sanded before the next layer can be applied. It’s not a one day project.
Also before painting, the electrician needs to finish his work insetting the electrical outlets. When he began moving the outlets and light switches, he made them with visible tracks and plastic boxes that sit on top of the wall. I didn’t see this until he had done several and asked him to change it so that everything is set in the wall. Otherwise it looks tacky. We’ll need to spackle all of the areas that he works on when he finishes. As I said previously, it took him quite some time to get here so I don’t know when he’ll finish up.
Another project is the area under the stairs.
This area has been used for storage, and that was concealed by the kitchen wall units. Once they were moved, the storage space is visible and it doesn’t look nice. I’d like to close it in and put an access door there, using the door that was part of the separate entrance that we took down. You can look above at the pictures of the stairs and the railing and you’ll see what I’m referring to.
Yesterday afternoon one of the boys cut it down to fit the shorter entrance area but I’m not at all happy with how it looks. I’m concerned that once it’s installed no one will later be willing to replace it with something that looks better. My husband and the boys all think it looks fine but I’m the most visual person of them all so that’s not surprising. At this point, redoing the door means a huge amount of work that no one, including me, is interested in right now. So I once again I remind myself, ‘Done is better than perfect!”
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One day midweek, ds15 took out our welder to try to figure out how to weld. This was providential timing since the plumber arrived right after that. Seeing the welder and the pile of metal beams that had been taken down from the porch, the plumber commented that now they can build something with it. Ds15 told him they don’t know how to weld very well.
The plumber used our welder to finish installing the railing. Having seen how good the boys were at other building related things, when he finished working he took the time to give ds15 and ds17 (ds18 and I were gone that day) some instruction. Just ten minutes was all they needed to move beyond what they already knew how to do, to really being able to weld properly. This is a skill that we all felt our family was missing. We can build with wood, and building with metal is somewhat similar except you melt the metal together instead of screwing wood together.
Ds afterward cut pieces of metal and practiced welding them onto a post, and when the plumber came back the next day, he looked at it and said it was well done.
Now ds15 and ds17 have learned to weld, and they’ll be able to show ds18. We’re all pleased to have a new skill learned.
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Not only was the kitchen finished yesterday, so was the chicken coop! It looks great. Ds18 did most of the building for this, with ds15 helping out. It’s a really nice coop. They used our scrap wood supply to build it, and the supply is now almost completely finished. Ds15 used some scrap metal that we had (not a weldable metal) and made a beautiful door, lightweight and strong. I marvel at how they get things done.
It’s been a productive week, but it hasn’t been all work. “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy!” Each morning the boys spend several hours in shul learning Torah before coming home and starting on our work projects. One afternoon they took a hike with friends midday; last night they had a singing circle at a local spring with other friends. They always stop whatever they’re doing before it’s time to go to shul for mincha/maariv and don’t resume after coming home at night. While it’s been busy, it’s been balanced, and as I said previously, it’s a really nice energy when they work together.
The electrician came back and put in the new outlets, and though there’s still more work for him to do, it no longer requires us to wait on installing the new kitchen.
New outlets in, the island before it was dismantled
Having the go ahead to get busy taking apart the kitchen unleashed my sons’ energy and they all got to work. While I cleaned up the kitchen so the boys could dissemble it all, they took the countertop off of the island. This wasn’t easy because it was securely glued down on all sides, but perserverance is a good quality to have and they got it off.
Ds17 – left; ds15 – center, ds18 – right
Once that was done, they took the countertop outside – it’s a huge and heavy piece of stone – and then turned to dissembling the final part of the kitchen. The hardest part of a kitchen renovation is when the sink is taken out because that’s the heart of food preparation and cleanup. Here they are soon after they began.
The kitchen countertop was much easier to remove than the island countertop – it’s always nice when it happens that you’ve done the harder thing first and the second time around it’s easier. They removed it from the base cabinets while separating the two sections that had been seamed together.
The kitchen is almost completely taken apart! All that’s left to move are the top hanging cabinets.
I had to change my original (exhaustively thought out) floor plans after finding out how expensive it would be to have a professional refabricate our existing countertops. We decided we would try to cut the countertop ourselves, and to keep the current double sink that is already installed in the countertop rather than have two separate sinks along two different walls. (Cutting the sink spaces would require specialty equipment that we don’t have.)
That meant big changes to the intended layout. It was a little stressful to make changes at this point since the gas installation had already been done, the plumbing already begun, and I had detailed my plans to the electrician. It’s not comfortable when your plans suddenly need to be changed but I feel good about the changes and it’s going to be great.
Here are the cabinets reassembled in their new location.
The countertop to the left is what used to be on the island, but now is cut down to fit these cabinets
Ds17 enjoys working with the router (remember my last post when he was the one to take apart the metal pergola?), so the other boys said he should be the one to cut down the countertop from the island. Working with big pieces of stone isn’t a one person job, though – they were all involved even though he’s the one who did the cutting.
After they took apart and rebuilt the cabinets, ds17 cut down the large piece that topped the island so it’s the right depth. He told me after doing it that it made him feel like there was nothing about renovating a kitchen that was hard.
You can’t give a child confidence, but you can give them opportunities to stretch and learn new skills, and the resulting competence builds confidence.
The plumber was supposed to come later in the afternoon to connect the water pipes, but then called to say he forgot he had a dentist appointment so he couldn’t make it. I told him it was fine, but if he had even a little time to stop over after his appointment, we’d be glad to be able to use the water. I didn’t expect him to come until the next day, but he showed up and our water is now connected!
I’m so grateful and delighted that the hardest part of the renovation, not having a sink, lasted just a few hours. It’s been uncomfortable living with things in disorder for the last two and I’ve felt some discomfort about having to continually remind workmen about coming, but having the sink back in use so quickly makes the entire renovation feel so much easier. I’m not yet using the sink because the counters aren’t in and it’s not sealed for water, so I don’t want to damage anything with water leaking through. But just being able to get a drink of water is helpful.
And of course, one more important piece that needed to be finished is off my mental list.
Tomorrow I’m going to make a trip with ds18 to Beit Shemesh. He’s going to meet with someone there, while I go to the carpentry shop and buy toekicks (the covering for the area under the cabinets). If you’re wondering why I’m not buying closer to home, I went to a carpentry shop locally and he didn’t have the size I needed, and the Beit Shemesh store has what I need and will cut it to size while I wait. I know from experience that when you delay finishing touches while using your kitchen, you may never get to them – we never put toekicks on the part of the old kitchen where the sink was – and I didn’t want to make that mistake again. Hence a long trip at a busy time when there are many other things requiring my attention.
From there, I intend to look for wall tiles at an outlet store in Petach Tikva, as well as another large item for another project that we definitely won’t begin until after Pesach. I’m going to leave right after the kids go to school, with the hope I’ll be back before they get home. With Pesach so close, I want to get this done now because otherwise I’ll have to wait until after Pesach to make the trip.
I’m not planning to do the tiling before Pesach – my focus will be on taking down the tiling in the old kitchen area and getting the area spackled and ready for painting before Pesach. It may get painted before then, I’m not sure. It would be nice but I want to be realistic about what is doable – it’s important to go into the holiday feeling calm and rested, not worn out and stressed.
For tomorrow the focus will be to continue working on the countertop – the sides of this large piece that was cut needs to be trimmed flat on each end side – they’re currently rounded slightly since they were the edges of the island and it needs to fit snugly against the next piece. Then there are two more pieces to cut. One is for the area to the right of the sink, which has a curved wall next to it. The second piece will be to cover the 20 cm gap between the end of the counter and the appliance garage on the left.
My three teen boys all have vacation and I just love when they’re home together!
The hazard of having them home is they like to all congregate together in my room at night to hang out so it’s hard to do any writing or go to sleep. The years go by quickly and I don’t want to lose this time with them.
Yesterday was the first day of them working together; it’s so, so nice because first of all, I love seeing them together, and secondly, every single one of them is really helpful and knows how to get things done. When they work together, they’re an amazing team. When I ask them to do something, they do what I want in the time frame that I want. I have yet to find anyone I can pay who works nearly as well as them; my daughter who lives here has had the same experience.
The progress of my kitchen renovation has been very delayed. The first stage of the electric work needed to be completed before any cabinets could be put in place, and the electrician finally came two weeks after he said he would come. That’s pushed everything off, and though I’ve felt some impatience to get this going and get it done so I can move on to Pesach preparations, it’s been okay that it’s taken longer.
This is how it’s looked for almost two weeks while we waited for him to come; there’s a light switch and outlet behind where the wall units that needed to be moved.
Once the electrician came and moved the light switch, ds15 and ds17 were finally able to put together the wall units. It was so nice to have them in place.
I still need outlets above where the new counter area will be, before moving the base cabinets and countertops into place; the electrician said he would come back in a few days.
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I had to go out for a few hours in the morning and since they didn’t want to take apart the kitchen if I wasn’t there, the boys found constructive activities to busy themselves with.
Our porch upstairs is a nice size but as a porch it doesn’t get much use (other than the teens sleeping there at night since they like the fresh air) since we have so much outdoor space downstairs. As the families of our married children grow, it’s harder and harder for parents to share a room with all of their children. When they come on a weekend when no other married siblings are here, it’s no problem to give them two bedrooms, but when we have other guests, we don’t have that option.
For the last five years we’ve been paying higher property tax for the open porch as if it’s an enclosed part of the house and that’s kind of annoying, so I’ve often thought there’s some additional incentive there to rebalance things (ie and close in the porch) so we have the benefit of what we’re being taxed for.
My mother-in-law and sister-in-law will be coming from the US to stay with us for all of Pesach. This year we had four married children who wanted to come for the Pesach seder but even after the teens agreeing to vacate their room for my mother-in-law and sister-in-law to stay in, we only had two more guest rooms. Obviously the math doesn’t work out for everyone to be here at once!
I didn’t want to tell anyone not to come but we just didn’t have space for everyone at one time. This is the first time I’ve been unable to accomodate everyone, since my local daughter has guest space and was able to host our overflow guests for sleeping.
After several weeks of feeling stymied, I finally decided that we’ll split the hosting of the married kids. Two of them will come for the seder, and the other two will come for the end of Pesach. One family will come for the middle days of Pesach. One has lived locally until this week (they’re moving to RBS-D near my oldest son’s family) so they aren’t coming for Pesach. Then next year, those who came for the last days this year will come for the seder, and those who came for the seder will come for the end of Pesach. So the plan is to alternate guests for the seder every year, instead of having everyone at once.
You can see that we can use some additional sleeping space!
My teens were enthused about closing in the porch but my husband requested a pause on it, explaining that when there’s a project with details he wants to be able to oversee it. With the kitchen renovation still very much in progress, he asked that we not have two big projects simultaneously taking place.
I could see the logic in that but felt it was a shame to waste all of the manpower available during this very short period of time, since if we don’t do it now, they won’t be available until the summer. With so much family coming for Pesach it would be nice to have more hosting space but I respected my husband’s preference and we put the porch project to the side.
I don’t know what changed when I was out for just four hours – my husband said when he was watching the boys work he saw how competent they were and that made him more comfortable with them doing the porch now. But when I came back, I heard very loud noises from the porch and as I came into our yard, looked up to see my sons taking apart the metal pergola.
That took me by surprise! It was a huge job, since it’s constructed of heavy duty metal pieces welded in place, and it took several hours to cut it down. The three of them started working on it together but then ds17 did most of the work to cut it apart. They recognize their strengths and tend to assign jobs according to who is best at/ enjoys what the most. They joke that ds17 is best at deconstructing and ds18 is best at constructing, but the truth is they’re all good at everything.
Here’s what it looks like once the metal pergola was taken down:
Now we have a large amount of high quality metal to work with – believe it or not, I don’t yet have any projects in mind for them
The next step is to order the building materials to close in the porch. My husband spent a couple of days working out the specifics on exactly what we need, and will place the order tomorrow (assuming they have what we need in stock – if they don’t, they said we’ll have to wait until after Pesach).
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While ds17 was working on that, ds18 and ds15 began building a new chicken coop for the Brahmas that we bought a few weeks ago. I planned to build it in our small backyard but then I changed my mind, and decided they’ll need more room than we have there since we’re planning to expand the Brahma flock.
Our first three Brahma chicks hatched a few days ago – ds17 had been planning to incubate a new batch of eggs at the end of the week they arrived, so we stuck in the few eggs they had laid along with the rest. Now we have a batch of 70 new chicks. We’ll start incubating another batch of eggs probably this week, this time mostly Brahma eggs, and in all likelihood that will be the final batch of chicks that we’ll hatch out until next year.
They made great progress on the coop and it’s looking good. They needed more supplies and weren’t able to complete it, but in the next couple of days I’ll make a run to the hardware store to get what’s missing so they can finish it.
But before that, tomorrow I want to work on the kitchen, and take out the sinks, counter, base cabinets, detach the top of the island from the cabinet part, then cut down the stone counters and hopefully reassemble it all together. That’s the plan!
Here’s where we were up to in my last post – the kitchen island was taken out, the wall units were dissembled and moved, the tile backsplash for the stove was taken down, and the small wall and doorway to the stairs was removed entirely.
My teens told me that the drywall was badly damaged when taking down the tile wall, and I told them it’s not a big deal, we’ll replace it. They had a different suggestion – why not take down the entire wall closing in the staircase?
I had to pause to think about that. One advantage of having the door and the walls there is it makes it much easier to heat and cool the main living area. If it’s wide open to the second floor, that’s going to be much more challenging (read: expensive).
The door and wall made the two floors of our house more separate from one another, and provides our guests with a lot of privacy when they come to visit. We sometimes host guests of others for sleeping and the guests appreciate how much privacy they have, with a separate entrance to a completely separate apartment. But with the door already gone, the privacy and separation our guests had was already diminished.
Taking down the wall wouldn’t give us any additional space. The only thing it would do is make our living area feel more spacious.
Some people like cozy little spaces. I don’t.
I love, love, love open space. I don’t like to feel crowded. A friend visited a couple of years ago and commented that ever since she knows me (about twenty years), I’m always finding ways to maximize our space and make it more open. I had never been conscious of how consistent I’ve been about that.
Interestingly, since taking down the little wall that was behind our kitchen sinks, it’s much easier for me to keep the dishes washed. It wasn’t until that wall was down that I realized I had reluctance to stand in an area that felt constricting for me to wash the dishes and would therefore put it off.
Here’s a view of the stairs and the wall in question.
Having a feeling of more space was a gain for me – I gave the go ahead to take the wall down!
My boys were delighted. There’s a feeling of accomplishment that’s different than doing a little repair or hanging a picture when there’s a big project like completely rehauling the kitchen.
Assessing what needs to be done to release the top of the wall
The bottom of the wall separated readily but the top wasn’t coming down so easily!
Teen boys need a lot of physical activity and challenge. During their last vacation, our three teens organized a two day bike trip around the perimeter of the Kinneret/Sea of Galillee with a few friends, and I was very supportive of a trip like this. Teens need meaningful activity and challenge; they get bored and into trouble when they don’t have it.
“One, two, three, push!”
I left them figuring out what to do to get the wall down while I ran a couple of errands. When I came back, the wall was gone, the rubble was removed and the floor was swept. And they felt very accomplished!
View from one sideView from the other side
I am so happy with how this changes our space. Most of the year I keep my front door open to allow light and air in, but I’m now keeping the side door open instead. I have a nice view of our yard, great airflow and it feels much more spacious.
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Now that the wall is down we have another project. As nice and open as it now is, we can’t have a staircase with no railing! So ‘install staircase railing’ has gone onto the to do list.
I found a railing that I wanted on Yad2, a second hand site, but it was in a location I wasn’t comfortable driving alone to. And it was a huge heavy piece of railing that even with help I was afraid I couldn’t load onto my car. And once it was on, I was concerned about getting it securely lashed down. And then once it was tied down, I was worried about driving with it.
I don’t usually worry much about getting things done but once I had found and called about it, all of the other parts of it were outside of my comfort zone.
Bless my husband, who agreed to leave at 4:15 in the morning to drive there and get it, and then come back home and get to work.
So the first big part of the railing project is done – buying the railing. The next step will be installing it, and metal work unfortunately isn’t something the Werner family knows how to do. We asked the person doing the plumbing if he can help us get this done and he agreed. He said he’ll try to do it on Friday morning, when a friend of his who is a metal worker is available to help him.
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The new gas line has been laid and the stove moved from next to the staircase to its new location, and we were able to move the loveseat into the area that will be our new living room.
Here’s what it looked like beforeHere’s what it looks like now. In addition to putting up a railing, we need to reorganize the under the staircase storage and move the shelving that’s still there.
Here’s the stove in its new location, in what used to be our living room. The island next to it is temporary; there will be a long counter with a sink in it once we’re done. It’s nice to have the stove piece finished. Right now we’re keeping the curtains tied back so there’s no fire hazard; I’m going to replace them with blinds but that’s still on the list.
Yesterday afternoon the plumber began digging and drilling to put in new outlet points for the sink drainage to the main sewage line. Each of the two kitchen sinks will need their own lines. The sewage line for the first sink is finished.
Tomorrow I’ll be going to Beit Shemesh to attend the siddur party for my oldest granddaughter. I got notice this afternoon that ds7 will not be allowed on the school bus tomorrow and will have to stay home. Usually I don’t mind – he’s not hard to have around when it’s just the two of us – but tomorrow I won’t be here. I was feeling stressed trying to figure out what to do. I didn’t tell my granddaughter I’m coming, but I’ve had it on my calendar for weeks since she first told me about it and it’s a priority for me.
My husband can’t work and supervise ds7 (he needs constant supervision, it’s almost unbelievable how much he gets into and how quickly it happens). Our original plan was that he would take over for me at 2 pm when ds12 and ds8 got home – he can set them up with an educational video while he works. (Between the drive there, the party and then the drive back, that’s most of my day.) Then at 3 the twins come and at that point he would be fully available and take off of work.
Knowing how important it is to me to go to this party, he’s going to take the entire day off of work.
The electrician said if it rains he’ll come tomorrow and do some work for us. I’m the one taking care of the this project so I’d really rather be here when he’s doing the work, but I’ll leave detailed instructions for my husband in case the electrician shows up – it’s hard to get him here, and once he’s here I want him to be able to make progress! I have one place where if he can move a light switch, it will enable us to reassemble and attach all of the wall units so if he has even a small amount of time and can do that, it would help us move forward with putting things in order.
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I’ve had a question come up about my plans for the countertops. It turns out I need a small piece less than a meter long to cover a blind corner (the one to the left of the stove above). I contacted the business I bought the countertops from and he no longer does the cutting and installation. He does have the design that we bought so we can buy another piece, but we need to have a different company cut it to size and install the sink in the island countertop for the opposite wall. This has thrown a wrench into my plans.
I went to see the other company today to get a quote for the work and it’s going to be much more costly than I expected. That leaves me with a dilemma. It would be great if laminate countertops were an easily available option in Israel, but they’re not since stone countertops are the norm. I don’t want to spend this amount of money adding on to used countertops; the purpose of using the countertops was to keep costs down. Now we’re considering if we would be better off spending more and getting new countertops put in. Well, I’m considering it – my husband thinks stone countertops are a rip off.
Whether I add on to the current countertops or get new ones, the factory that cuts them won’t be able to have them ready until a few days before Pesach. I can find a way to work with that, but it delays finishing the kitchen well beyond my latest projected target date.
Over five years ago we were house hunting, and one thing that struck me as not making sense about the house we ended up buying when we saw it was the location of the kitchen. I couldn’t figure out why in the world the builder had made it the room you entered into when you open the front door.
I decided we would swap the kitchen and living room locations. (I later saw the floor plans and it was supposed to built in the area we wanted to move it to – apparently the contractor took a shortcut and placed it where he did because it was easier.) We intended to do these renovations before we moved in.
But then covid happened, and that changed all of my plans. We moved from Ramat Beit Shemesh extremely abruptly, arriving on the first day of the most draconian lockdown that Israel was to experience. Instead of the freshly renovated home we had planned to move into, we moved into a home in need of a lot of work. We got busy working on that as soon as we got here. However, it then became complicated to do a kitchen renovation of the scale that I previously planned while we were living there.
Additionally, it was a time of extreme physical isolation and getting workers to do the work we weren’t qualified to do was difficult. When I had the gas line moved, we all had to vacate the house so the worker could do the work – he said that was the covid guideline that he had to work under.
That was work that took less than an hour, but we couldn’t stand outside for hours a day, for days on end, in order to have new plumbing laid and new flooring put down. Additionally, one wall in the adjoining room where I wanted to move it to is asymetrically curved, and I was having a hard time figuring out how to use it well. Taking into account the reality and constraints of the world at the time, we decided to keep it simple, and put in and extend the kitchen in the area where it was already located.
This was the fifth of the kitchens that we’ve renovated and it was the hardest to figure out the design for because of the awkward space we had to work with, but it’s been a very functional kitchen and served us well. But I’ve never been able to make my peace with people entering our home directly into the kitchen, especially since our kitchen is very heavily used. There’s always some kind of cooking or eating or project going on, so there’s always some kind of activity in progress. It never looks like a still life photo for more than ten minutes at the very most, and you know the likelihood of visitors coming in during those ten minutes, right?
I’ve finally decided to do something about the ongoing discomfort I feel about this set up. I’ve gone back and forth about how to renovate – once we’re doing the work, it would be nice to change the cabinet color and style (what we got was also a covid decision) to something that is more my preference. But I have a financial goal of paying down my mortgage and a major renovation would definitely set that back.
My reasons for doing this renovation are two fold: having a more private kitchen and opening up the floor space so there’s more room for hosting. When I reminded myself what my priorities were, I realized I can achieve what is most important to me and keep my costs reined in pretty tightly.
The way I’m going to make the numbers work is to use the existing kitchen cabinets and countertops. Everything will have to be reconfigured to fit a very different space. Right now I have one double sink; the new kitchen will have two separate sinks on opposite walls. I’ll use the current double sink and attached countertop on one wall, and I’ll have the large island countertop refabricated with a sink installed in it for the opposite wall. There will be costs for plumbing, electricity and having the existing counters custom cut, but that will be much less than a new kitchen.
A week ago I spent a morning doing renovation preliminary work: arranging for the electrician, plumber and gas installer to come. Then I moved the fridge, freezer, island and couches. It was gratifying to see some movement in the direction I want to go.
A few hours later, I got the call from the social worker letting me know they were having the meeting at our home a couple of days later, and with some frustration about all the time and effort I had wasted, moved everything back in place and cancelled all of the workmen. I didn’t want the foster care agency representatives to come for a visit in the middle of a big renovation.
Fortunately with another week comes another beginning….:)
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This morning my seventeen year old son and I moved the appliances, island and couches. He’s rarely around and it was nice to work with him.
By the time I thought of taking a ‘before’ picture, the counters were covered with things that we had pulled out, the fridge and freezer had been moved to their new location, and the cabinets were beginning to be dissembled – and there was no way I was going to undo all that we did just to take a neat picture even though it pains me to show my kitchen looking like this. Mess happens when you take a kitchen apart, and I really wanted to share our starting place as I document what we’re doing.
The fridge and freezer were against the wall on the far side of the island, where the couch is now
Once we got started, it changed very fast!
Since it was Shushan Purim, all of the younger kids were home from school. It’s really not ideal to start a project like this with young children who get into everything, but my seventeen year old is rarely home with time to help out with something like this and I wanted to make the most of the opportunity.
Ds17 put ds12 to work as his assistant and he was helpful doing real work, not the kind of fake jobs you give to kids to make them feel like they’re helping.
The island was moved, next job was to take apart the wall units
My fifteen year son came home while the wall units were being dissembled, and he got to work with us, taking down the tile backsplash behind the stove. It’s so enjoyable to work together as a team – there’s an energy that’s really different from each person doing their jobs separately.
Ds15 told me it was a little sad for him to remove all of the tile, remembering all the work they put into tiling the kitchen.
Backsplash and wall units are gone
Once that was done, the teens both wanted to take down the small wall behind the section of the kitchen that has the sink. It’s an annoying little wall but necessary to have a private side entrance to our home that leads directly to our second floor, which used to be a vacation rental apartment. We decided to get rid of the private entrance so we could open up the space more, so ds15 took down that door, door frame and wall.
Ds15 taking down door frame
The wall is down!
I mentioned that the younger kids were home, didn’t I? They were very interested in all the changes being made.
They continually found ways to actively participate!
Can you see below how removing that wall made it feel more spacious? It also lets in so much light and air, and makes access to the side patio from the house more convenient.
After taking apart the little wall and looking at how damaged the wall was where the tile backsplash was, we were inspired to go even further in opening up our space. I’ll share more about that in my next post.
We’ve made wonderful progress today. The electrician will come tomorrow morning to see what needs to be done, and then I’ll schedule with him when to come. The plumber will start the work on Tuesday, and once the plumbing is done, I can put all the base cabinets in place, which has to be done before the countertop fabricators can come to measure for the recuts for the countertop.
My last kitchen renovation took just five days, which was super fast, but I don’t anticipate that this time around. Just the plumbing alone will take four days. My hope is to be finished by the end of next week, so that there will be time to get ready for Pesach without having renovations going on at the same time.
This summer a massive heat wave killed off all of our chickens but three, leaving us with just one rooster and two hens.
We fortunately had eggs in the incubator at the time, and the chicks that hatched out have been the foundation of regrowing our flock. Half grew into roosters who are unfortunately still around (I’ve wanted them to be processed for the past two months but there have been repeated delays and I’m somewhat exasperated about it). From the female half we still have hardly had any eggs, since it takes about five months until a chicken begins to lay eggs. Our hens came of age during the shortest days of the year, which further delayed their laying.
Finally about three weeks ago, some of them began laying. We’re now getting seven eggs a day, which isn’t nearly enough for our needs but it’s very nice to have them after so long with nothing! Some of the hens aren’t yet ready to lay but will soon, and that will also increase the number of eggs we get.
Below you can spot an a first time egg from a new layer – isn’t it adorable?
Even with all of the hens laying, we won’t have enough eggs to provide for our needs. While it’s nice to have supplemental eggs, I’d actually really appreciate having enough eggs to eat to make a difference to our diets.
I’ve collected eggs to incubate.
Although all chicken care transferred from my son to me at the beginning of last year, my seventeen year old son remains the expert on incubation. I asked him to check the heat calibration of the incubator to be sure it was accurate – last year it wasn’t and the excess heat killed the viability of all seventy eggs in that batch. I don’t want to do multiple incubator batches this year, just one big batch.
Last night he put in over sixty eggs.
All of those eggs won’t hatch; of those that hatch all the chicks won’t survive, and a percentage of those that survive the initial few weeks won’t make it to adulthood. In adulthood, there are still mishaps that can occur.
The saying, “Don’t count your eggs before they hatch” comes to mind.
I am hopeful, though, that by the summer we could have a nice amount of laying hens. That’s the goal – we’ll see how it works out!
By the way, I’ve seen suggestions for those concerned about high egg prices to get chickens. It’s really not that simple and definitely not inexpensive. You need to buy chickens (expensive), build a coop (expensive) and then raise them (ongoing feed costs and care). I don’t consider raising chickens for eggs to be a frugal strategy. It would take a long time to recoup the costs invested in raising chickens – I’m sure we’re nowhere near it. Of course, if we had done things in a more business-like way with the intention to make money, it could be we’d have done better in that regard, but that wasn’t our focus.
Having said that, it enhances our quality of life to have chickens so we have them even if they aren’t frugal.
When I shared that a number of people in our family eat zero carb and others eat a very high animal protein diet, people wondered how much we spend every month. I’ve carefully tracked every food item that I’ve purchased this past month, so that I can share with you what I bought and what I paid for it. For reference, I’ve also included the dates and the stores I shopped at.
Note: food is my highest budget item, meaning that this is the category I spend the most on every month.
January 6, 20255 – Yesh Chesed –2264.44 – in conjunction with the price increases of Jan. 1, many stores ranexcellent sales the first week.
21.45 kg meat x 49.90 – 1284.97
19.42 kg meat x 49.90 – 1163.26
natural grape juice, 3 x 7.90 – 23.7
tilapia – (on sale 14.90) – 2.144 kg – 31.95
tilapia – 1.889 kg x 24.90 – 47.04 minus 8.56 sale discount- 38.48 total (only part of this purchase was at the sale price)
sugar, 10x 3 – 30 shekels (usually 4.90 each)
There was a minimum purchase of 100 shekels on non sale items needed to get all of the above at the sale prices, so I bought:
butter, 200 grams ( 11 x 8.90) – 97.90
1 sour cream – 2.70
January 6, 2025 – Yavniel supermarket – 7.84 – ingredients for group my teen leads
January 6, 2025 – Yavniel supermarket – 128.83
carrots, 1.225 kg x 5.90 – 7.23
3 trays of eggs, 30 eggs each x 32 shekels – 96
3 challahs – 25.60
January 7, 2025 – Mishnat Yosef – 288.80
carrots – 4.80
Pink Lady apples – 13.2
peanut butter, 4 x 7.5 – 30
7 trays of 30 eggs x 28.80 each – 201.60
station fee (3) plus non food items – 39.20
January 9, 2025 – Rami Levi – 30.81, cheese, just short of a kilo for 31 shekels a kg
Jan. 11, 2025 – Shufersal – 4.60– 2 bananas (took two of the younger kids to an orthodontist appointment and wanted to get them a snack afterwards)
Jan. 11, 2025 – Rami Levi – 195.16
whole chickens,6.78 x 18.90 – 128.18
chicken hearts, .756 x14.90 – 11.42 (dog)
chicken hearts, .840 x 14.90 – 12.52 (dog)
tilapia – 2.60 x 19.90 – 51.74
January 14, 2025 – Mishnat Yosef – 180
1 package of fresh dill – 3.8
vitamin d drops 2 x 29 – 58
4 trays of eggs, 30 eggs each – 28.8 x 4 – 115.20
station fee – 3
January 21, 2025 – Mishnat Yosef – 232
onions, 2 -2 kg bag – 3.75 kg x 4 – 15
sweet potatoes, 2 kg – 10
4 honey, 900 grams – 17.90 x 4 – 71.60
dried dates, 1 kg – 14.50
3 trays of eggs, 28.80 x 3 – 86.40
January 23, 2025 – Shufersal – 161.58
seltzer (1.5 liters), six pack, 2 x 16.90 – 33.80
cottage cheese, 6 shekels x 10 – 60
15% sour cream, 21 x 2.77 – 58.17
red peppers – 1.595 x 5.90 – 9.41
January 23, 2025 – Rami Levi – 815.50 – this receipt seems to have gotten lost – it was whole chicken, chicken quarters, chicken thighs, 2 pkg chicken livers (for dog) and almost 3 kg of salmon (on sale for 50 shekels a kg)
Jan. 28, 2025 – Mishnat Yosef –266.20
avocados, 5.90 kg x 3 kg – 17.60
celery – 4.4
parsley – 3.8
sliced bread (750 gram loaf), 5.60 x 2 – 11.20
10 – 1 kg bags spelt flour – 76.50
4 trays of eggs, 28.80 – 115.20
non food items – 34.50
3 shekel station fee
Jan.29, 2025 – butcher –1474.70
ground beef, 20.99 kg x 50 – 1049.50
ground beef fat, 10.63 kg x 40 – 425.2
January 29, 2025 – Rami Levi – 401.95
chicken wings, 48.77 kg x 6.90 – 366.55
chicken thighs, 2.989 kg x 21.90 – 65.46 (sale price for up to 3 kg, if there’s a purchase of non sale items over 75 shekels)
My total grocery purchases for January came out to 6487.48 shekels.
The total includes all food and also the odds and ends that I get at a supermarket that aren’t food. Our family of eight daily eaters includes 4 adults who have mostly animal products, 1 adult and three children who eat a heavily meat based diet but also have some produce and starches, and a medium sized dog.
At least one Shabbos a month (sometimes as much as three times a month) we host our married children and their families, in addition to one adult son who comes home for one Shabbos a month. Most of the refreshments for the boys’ group that my teen son runs also comes out of our food budget.
I set a goal to get down to 6000 for the month of January; in the last few months since adding two adult carnivores to the mix I’ve spent close to 7500 and I challenged myself to lower the expenses in this area. While I could have come in below 6000 if I delayed the last purchases made at the end of the month. However, I didn’t have any ground beef left, and I had the opportunity to get a large amount of chicken wings at an amazing price and don’t know if a week later that would have been the price, so I bought them when I had the opportunity.
Most of the chicken and meat I bought in the last week of January will be eaten in February. It all evens out, since at the end of December I bought a lot of meat that we ate in January.
Produce – We don’t eat a lot of produce but we do eat more than what it looks like from this post. You won’t see everything we use listed, only what we paid for. I’ll share more about produce in a separate post.
Bulk grocery purchases – This month I also did a bulk shopping run, which I do infrequently. (It’s been over a year and a half since my last bulk shopping trip.) Last month my husband took the car to work in Tel Aviv, which is not far from the bulk store, and to maximize the gas being spent, he stopped in to buy about 500 shekels of items there.
I purposely schedule a bulk shopping trip during a month that is lower in expenses. Averaging my spending for this over the year, it adds another 200 shekels to our monthly purchases. I’m including this shopping in the list of things I bought this month, but keeping the bulk order separate from the other food orders. If I need to refill anything that was bought in bulk during the coming year, it will be included in the monthly grocery category.
January 19, 2025 – 1326 – bulk shopping (the total includes 18% tax but the individual items are listed before the tax has been added)
coconut cream, 1 liter carton x 12 – 138
tuna fish, 1 kg vacuum pack x 12 – 258
vinegar, 4 liter – 8.50
tomato paste, A10 can (2.5 kg) x 2 – 42
mini tuna cans, 95 grams – 2.75 x 12 – 33
cocoa powder, 1 kg – 35
baking soda, 1 kg – 5.20 x 3 – 15.60
dried coconut strips, 1 kg – 31.50 x 2 – 63
sunflower seeds, 1 kg – 13 x 2 – 26
fish gelatin, 1 kg – 95
walnuts, 1 kg – 35
flax seeds, 1 kg – 5.30
dried apples, 1 kg – 22 x 2 – 44
cheddar cheese – 7.80 kg – x 32 – 282.80
kashkaval cheese, 200 gr – 9 (I treated myself)
dish soap, 18 kg bucket – 68
January 19, 2025 – 755.70 – bulk shopping
2 – 20 kg case coconut oil – 354 x 2 – 708 (this will last a year)
For the month of February, I’m again setting a goal of 6000 shekels for groceries. Let me know if you found this breakdown helpful, and if you’d like to see me track the breakdown again!
How much do you spend on your monthly food shopping, and how many people are you feeding? Do you have any questions about the shopping I did? Share in the comments!
The wild plants are shooting up all around us and this morning as soon as I put our children on their school vans, I took the goats out to graze to enjoy the abundance!
It’s so peaceful to be with them in the quiet of the morning, watching them jump and happily pounce on their fresh salad spread. I love seeing how happy they are.
Enjoy a slice of my morning!
Dixie and Dakota, nine month doelings – Dixie is the baby goat that was on death’s door who I saved by dripping maple syrup water into her mouth with a strawDakota – the two doelings are completely identical except Dakota’s ears both stick straight up, and Dixie’s right ear is slightly bent – that’s how I tell them apart. Look at them in the next picture and see if you can identify which is which.Mocha, munching on a mouthful of grassEnjoying the lavish salad bar before them
I was sitting at my sewing machine working through a pile of pants to be repaired, when my daughter-in-law noticed what I was doing. She asked me if I could hem a skirt of hers, and I agreed, so she gave it to me. It wasn’t a major repair, it just needed a couple of minutes to sew and it was as good as new.
At the same time, a friend of my son came in and seeing what I was doing, asked me if I could fix his pants. Yes, I could, so he brought them to me and I repaired them as well.
It’s inconvenient and expensive to have your clothing repaired by someone else so most people will give or throw clothing away rather than deal with it. Replacing items that were overall in good condition other than the needed repair will cost money, and if you can maintain what you have so it lasts longer, you’ll be saving that money instead.
Basic things like replacing a button are super simple, but if you don’t know any sewing at all, you can find tutorials online that will demonstrate just about every sewing technique that you would want to learn.
I have a cabinet in my room where everyone knows to place anything they have that needs a sewing repair. It might be socks or tights, but usually are shirts that need buttons, pants that split in a seam, or something that needs to be tailored or patched. One son regularly gets his belt loops on the waist of his pants caught on door handles and they need to be reattached. Every so often I take out a pile, take out the sewing machine, and work through the necessary repairs.
My son really likes his pair of loafers, and wanted to continue wearing them even when the leather loop attached to the buckle detached, leaving the buckle hanging off to the side. I assumed I’d have to throw them away, but I took a look at them before doing so. I realized that the loops on each side had come unsewn, and thought I might be able to resew them.
I have a package of unusual needle sizes that are heavy duty, and found one that I was able to push through the leather. Less than ten minutes later, both sides of the loafer were sewn back on. If you look closely, you can see my repair but it’s not noticeable at a first glance. (The loose thread isn’t from my repair but I should snip it off.)
Why would I would waste time repairing these shoes, or fixing socks or tights? How much money am I really saving? It’s true that some things don’t cost that much. I can replace these shoes for 50 shekels on sale but although they aren’t expensive, ten minutes to save 50 shekels is still worth my time. If smaller items like socks are overall in good condition, I’ll fix those as well.
What about the time it takes? Aren’t I too busy for all of this stuff? Actually, these small repairs don’t take time out of my schedule since I take my sewing basket outside with me when I watch the kids play.
For the items that need the sewing machine, I wait until I have a pile – it could be two or three months – and then spend up to an hour repairing everything. That’s not a lot of time for what is usually at least seven to ten items of clothing.
Start to look at your items needing to be repaired with an appraising eye, and challenge yourself to repair an item that you would have in the past gotten rid of.
Do you do your own sewing repairs? If not, why not?
