Oh Summer. You wild & crazy beast.

The plan was to have the kitchen D.O.N.E. DONE by the end of June.

It is solidly the middle of July and the last 10% seems to be dragging on. And I mean DRAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGING on.

Summers have tended to be a little slower at work. Not this summer. This summer we are still without a director and with a coworker on maternity leave. New administration on campus, new initiatives, lots of new-new-new, do-do-do. Which is good. Truthfully. We needed a shaking up and boy did we get it. But gone are my slacker days of summer.

While I would like to blame the delays on work or things outside my control, that’s not completely the truth. Partially, maybe. But not totally. I’m enjoying the summer.

I’ve been watching a lot of soccer with this guy.

(who also happens to be the only reason I’ve lasted this long without a kitchen)

Enjoying summer storms at the shore and soaking in girl time with this lady while she was back home for a week.

That rad safari fabric covered canvas graced the lobby of the psychic we went to. Have you ever been to a psychic?? It was a first for me. Good times.

Making friends at the dog park (pittie smiles!!) and enjoying Saturday morning snuggles on the couch.

Picnics in the park with friends to listen to the New York Philharmonic and watch fireworks.

Turns out, picnic foods can absolutely be assembled without a kitchen. The brownies were baked by my mother and leftover from a family get together. See the part about my cousin being home for a week. The only challenge was attempting a balsamic reduction for the peach & burrata crostini without a stove.

I don’t think it counts as a reduction simply by distributing it across the inside of the microwave.

Other than having to clean the inside of the still-new-microwave, life is good. Really good.

The past month has even seen some progress on the kitchen.

When the range hood went in, I expected cutting down and installing the cover to be a quick & easy task. I should know by now that anytime I expect something to be quick &/or easy, it most certainly will not be either.

Turns out the hole I cut in the soffit cab cover panel – that I expected to be well behind the duct cover – was definitely not well behind the duct cover.

Add that to the spackle, sand, repeat list.

The cover panels for the very first upper cabinet I installed finally went up.

Cutting & sanding them took a bit of finesse. I wanted the right side to be pretty tight to the wall. Turns out the wall bows a bit. Caulk.

The bottom of the left side needed significant sanding down on the inside to accommodate the swing of the microwave door without binding. I don’t think you can really tell it’s not 3/4″ thick for the lowest 11″ unless you really look close. Win.

Now I have to take it all down to prime & paint it. I want wood to be finished & sealed between the panels & the microwave.

I made a pretty cool metal grate cover for this spot. Excited to see how it looks all painted & assembled.

I also started filling in the cavernous void behind the reinstalled picture rail.

It took a lot of effort to find the motivation to do this. You cannot see this eyesore from anywhere other than the top of a 6′ ladder. Out of sight, out of mind. Knowing I still had to do it delayed my ability to begin priming. Why break out the paint brushes if this wasn’t done?

A pastry bag of joint compound made the job less painful than I anticipated. I could/should have used real plaster but why? It’s a completely hidden void and the bucket of spackle was right.there.

It will need at least another coat. Massive globs of joint compound crack as they dry and this area is no different.

The biggest accomplishment of the month has been building out and installing the far left door of the soffit cabs.

This was the cabinet I custom-built super wide. It’s about 51″ long. In doing that (making it longer to make full use of the blind space), there was no ready-made place to mount the left door.

What you see below is the build-out to mount the door to. The hinges are just peeking out on the left. The photo was taken from the right interior wall of the cabinet facing the front/door opening. You can see me and the far dining room window through the opening.

I can take exactly 0% of any credit for making this happen. Dad, The Incredible did it all.

Well I did take these pictures, so that’s something. Ha.

One thing Dad, The Incredible does not do is the spackle, sand, repeat drill.

Or anything to do with a paintbrush.

I guess that’s 2 things. Or 17, if you count each layer, step & coat.

I did coerce him into helping strip the portico last year but usually building is as far as he goes. He will obsess over that last 1/32″ but has little to no patience for the tedium that comes with the finish work. I respect the man for drawing the line somewhere.

I’m very blessed for being able to work side-by-side and soak in his knowledge and experience. When we get to this point though, it’s all – you got this girl.

Unfortunately, the apple does not fall far from the tree. I loathe the spackle, sand, repeat drill and painting isn’t far behind. Spending Saturday morning snuggling my little land shark is much more appealing than lugging out the sander & shop vac.

Except, that’s what stands between me and a finished, functioning, stop-freaking-living-in-a-construction-zone kitchen. Maybe telling the Internet will light the fire under my tuchas to get ‘er done already.

Hold me to it, ok, friends?