New kitchen Sunday, 27-Nov-22 21:39:32 CET

Finished the kitchen stove ventilation Sunday, 11-Dec-22 22:14:46 CET

Monday, 05-Dec-22 20:32:28 CET

Appliances installed

This week we installed the appliances. Things were not as expected but we will find ways to fix this.

Monday 28 November

Today we were bound to work from our offices; however, the appliances would arrive between eight and ten in the morning.

	This morning, I first moved the old fridge and freezer out of the way.
	Two minutes to nine, the bus arrived.
	The driver placed all four appliances on the platform.
	It was a lot of stuff.
	Then the driver placed the things in our kitchen. Unpacking was not included in the service, although that was stated on the invoice.   I was okay with that because we can use cardboard for our non-dig garden.

The driver asked what my work was, and I told him I was a software developer. He then told me he was learning Python. That was a package deliverer with potential.

We both went to work at our offices when the appliances were delivered.

After work, I was stoked to get the things installed and put in their proper place. We started with the fridge and the freezer. Both these had the sign fridge on them, so we got a bit scared something went wrong with the order. But that was not the case. The first thing we unpacked was the freezer.

It had a handle on the left side. I had no preference on what machine was on what side. DW had preferred the fridge were on the right side, so she was already a little dissatisfied.

Then we unpacked the fridge, there was a lot of packaging material for a fridge, and to our surprise, it also had a handle on the left side. I suggested that then we switch the opening side on the fridge. DW saw this opportunity to make the freezer have the handle on the right side. That was all fine with me.

Then we started switching the opening side of the freezer. I have never done that before. DW said that the book said a mechanic from the reseller would have to come and switch the opening side; I did not want that. I wanted to have the result this evening.

We got the door removed; it did not feel like rocket science to me. Then we mounted the bottom hinge of the door.

We managed to get the door back and to work. Even the electronics in the door worked after we switched the hinge side. It was a little exciting when the door could not shut properly; that had to do with the fact that I placed a ring on the swivel point. When removing that ring, it worked flawlessly.

Next up was the stove. It missed a cable and a Perilex contact. What should we do? Well, our temporary stove had all of this. So I moved that cable to the new stove. I could even read how the temporary stove was connected to replicate that on our new sterling 600 MFT.

The stove was too low. It had feet made of plastic with some custom threading. The feet were too short, so the stove did not level with the surface of the benchtop. To solve that, I laid out a couple of leftover floor tiles. For now, that will do.

Oh noooo, we had missed one thing with the stove! The lower oven opened to the side. There the handle collided with the door of the adjacent cupboard. We discussed various options for solutions and concluded we should discuss this with the carpenter tomorrow.

The stove could be used, and that was great. The freezer and the fridge made a noise. We hoped this was only while the appliances were starting up.

Tuesday 29 November

Today was a regular work-from-home day for both DW and me. The carpenter came in the afternoon to install the dishwasher for us. Since it had a wooden front, he wanted to mount it. Fine with me. I was unsure how much he wanted to install, but I had no time to preinstall it for him, so in the morning, I unwrapped it, which was about it for my part.

When the carpenter came, it took him about 3 seconds to conclude that one bag was missing. He had installed more of these appliances, so he knew what to expect. There should be one bag with screws and small plastic parts, and things to fasten the dishwasher to the cupboard and fasten the front of the dishwasher. It was not there.

The build instructions had numbers of the different parts. It started with 2, and it counted up almost consecutively. The 5 was missing; instead, there were two number six! We missed 3, 4, 6, 6, 7a, 7b, 8, and 11. Weird numbering!

He helped me get it in place, though, and we connected it to the water, the drain, and the electricity so that it was possible to use. The hatch is made to have a robust spring mechanism to hold an MDF door, and since that door is not there, the spring is too strong. I looked around in the workshop for something heavy that I could use to put on the hatch to keep it down. I concluded that the vise was heavy enough. I packed it in a lot of wrapping so that all the sharp edges would not stick out, and there I had a weight package. It worked.

We discussed the issue with the oven door, and the carpenter would make a distance plug for us. Then we asked him if it would be possible to create a cupboard above the fridge and the freezer. We talked about the options and came to a design for the cupboard. We also asked if it was possible to get one strip of benchtop wall edge so that the edge would continue around the stove. He would look into that as well.

In the evening, we experimented with the stove. It turned out that one "programming button" of the stove was not functioning. The minus button on the front of the stove. I must say the build quality of this part is not that exquisite; the buttons are hanging a bit lose. You can see in the photo that they are not lining up perfectly well.

Wednesday 30 November

Today it was a regular work-from-home before noon. We decided to take old stuff to the recycling center in the afternoon, including the packaging material from the appliances and the old freezer and fridge. The new appliances are much more energy efficient. We don't want anyone to use these, so we don't bring them to the second-hand shop. They served us well, but now they are retired. There was still ice in the freezer when I unloaded it at the recycling center.

Thursday 1 December

Today was a work-from-office day. DW baked bread.

Friday 2 December

Also, on this day, I worked from the office. On the way home from the office, I bought deep-freeze pizzas. The new oven could handle the pizza very well.

After supper, we decided to move our crockery cabinet. It is not a regular crockery cabinet; it is straightforward furniture. It is home built and not by a regular carpenter. DW got it when she was young, and first, she used it as a wardrobe. We painted it white and added more shelves to it, and now we use it as a crockery cabinet. When I took the photo, I thought this was a significant moment. The front of the dishwasher is still missing, there are rests of protective paper, and the hallway still has to be plastered. There is more stuff to do.

While DW filled the cabinet, I hung the ventilator above the stove. It is hung so we will not collide our heads with the ventilator.

Taller people will still collide, but that is not our problem. There is a problem, though; the lamps of the ventilator are sharp and shining straight into our eyes. We will need to find a solution to that. I could make something nice with the 3D printer, but it is standing in the hall, and I still have no idea if it survived the move to the new house.

We seldom work this much on a Friday evening. This has to do with the fact that we will get friends to visit us tomorrow evening. Perhaps we work better under some form of stress.

Saturday 3 December

It was an overcast morning. Later that turned into an overcast day. Actually, the whole week has been overcast. Today we prepared for friends to visit us in the evening for dinner. We wanted to tidy up the living room after the building activities of the kitchen. The stove came with manuals in several languages. I decided to keep only the English manual because the stove is from the UK. The English manual for the fridge and freezer was also of better quality, so I kept those.

DW started preparing the food, and she would make pie. One pie with mangold, mushrooms we collected in Sweden, and parmesan cheese, and one pie with spinach and blue cheese. To this, a salad of tomato and kohlrabi. Both the mangold and the kohlrabi came from the salad beds.

I sowed the mangold and the kohlrabi on 14 August this year. The cucumber was the first to give in. For the rest, we harvested plenty from these beds. It has been charming. The loose-leaf lettuce was going strong until we got freezing temperatures. Then it was over.

While DW worked on the pies, I repotted indoor plants. I removed some dead plants and made our plants look better.

 

We had collected another box of things to bring to the second-hand shop. We brought the box to the shop and picked up new things. I found disco lights. I think that is fun. I also found hand tools: a hammer and pliers.

It was a little much to do before the guests arrived, but things fell into place at the right time. The guests arrived, and they inspected our kitchen. They liked it. It was nice catching up on the development of things. Not all news was good, though. The chickens had died from coccidiosis. For the rest, great fun with visitors. Our oven behaved well; it produced well-tasting pies.

Sunday 4 December

This day was devoted to visiting the PALs, meaning MIL and FIL. Also, BIL was present. Snow was predicted, but there came none. The entire day was overcast and chilly. It was great catching up on the family's whereabouts, and I noted that DWs mother was eager to see the development at our new house. I think that is possible soon.

This was a busy weekend because the nation was celebrating the birthday of a former bishop of Spain coming here on the annual tour.

We did not do so much DIY on the house today. It was good to take it easy on the last day of the week.

We got the appliances delivered and put in place. Most of them are working, but there are still things to do. I noticed an unexpected drawback: Wi-Fi in the living room has worsened. Until now, it was good access to Wi-Fi in the house on the ground floor. Now we installed appliances blocking Wi-Fi signals, like a fridge, a freezer, and the dishwasher. We already had a woodstove of metal, but in total, there much more metal surfaces added between the utility room and the couch in the living room. This means I will need to buy a repeater.

This concludes this week's blog. Next week the ventilator above the stove will be installed. That is the moment we can really start using the kitchen. It will be lovely.