Tuesday, June 12, 2012

To Hell and Back, a Kitchen's story

September 2011
Hurricane Irene devastated the first floor of my entire town.  Unfortunately, that included my house and kitchen, pictured above.  The  water level was just over three feet.  All the lower wood cabinets and major appliances had to be ripped out.


Halfway through the rebuild my cabinet guy sliced off his own finger, but Joey 9-fingers did a fine job overall.


November 2011

It took months, but now this kitchen is bitchin'!



January 2012
 
 The rest of the house is, um, a work in progress...

I'd like to thank the fine folks over at WWFC whose 30 days challenge and abject cruelty made me relive the most harrowing event of our lives.  Nicky, Mike, you're in my thoughts.

11 comments:

  1. Oh, wow! We renovated our kitchen, too. Thank goodness though we didn't have a Hurricane to go along with it.

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  2. I remember your posts about this ...um..."adventure". Glad to hear it's come together. I was hiking in Vermont the weekend after Irene and it was surprising how widespread the damage was.

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  3. Oh my! We have bad floods in the UK at the moment. I'm so glad to be living up high, out of danger. Mind you, I could do with a new kitchen ;)

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  4. I'm so glad it's all better now. What a nightmare for you and your family.

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  5. Nona M Edufus,
    that hurricane brought water, and insurance money -so it's a wash

    Mike,
    yeah, floodwater is like blogging, eventually it gets into everything

    Babs,
    if we ever move (and are able to sell our house) it'll be above the flood table

    Linda,
    it wasn't fun throwing out our possessions and ripping out our walls and such, but some of the rebuilding is fun and satisfying.

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  6. I can totally relate - having lost it all to fire. I remember that flood and your first pictures. We spent the weekend in the Northeast and visited Queechee Vermont - another area hit hard by the floods. Glad that you are through the worst.

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  7. Seriously curious about one thing: What about mold? I have mold problems and I live in a dry climate. I can't imagine what it would be like to have my house flooded.

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  8. Freakin' Hurricane Irene. Many of the neighboring areas near me are still trying to get through the damage that was left with all the flooding. Crazy. Glad things are looking up for you.

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  9. I don't know if it's just me, but I can't see the January 2012 photo, just a white box with the date in it.

    You know, if I was a better person, I would tell you that Rome wasn't built in a day and that you're doing a great job. But you and I both know I'm not a better person.

    Dude, get off your butt and fix the house already! :-)

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  10. Laughing,
    the worst is definitely behind us, now the summer's here and our pool is up, mmmmm summer...

    Mike,
    that's why everyone rips out their drywall, rugs, woods floors and basically everything "down to the studs". Then you open the windows, set up five or ten pro fans and let 'em run day and night for a few days. If you can dry out the house within a few days of the event the mold doesn't get a chance to take root.

    PJ
    recovery times vary wildly on the same block. Some people were done months ago, others have only just been raised and their former first level -now second level- has no floor yet. You can walk under the whole thing and look up into their kitchen, living room, bathroom -weird scene.

    Nicky,
    you were right the first time; Rome WASN'T built in a day and they had a million guys on the job. I got one -ME. And work has slowed since I'm wasting part of every day kicking the crap out of some very dubious prompts (and for this I blame YOU!)

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  11. So sorry about the devastation you endured and so glad you have a bitchen kitchen...even at the expense of a finger!!

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