Flooring, cabinets, and conjoining twins

My kitchen is a product of a few unlikely things:
- my Uncle Tom and Aunt Kathy's decision to remodel their own kitchen a couple years ago
- my uncle's crazy (read brilliant) idea to drive a uHaul from North Canton with his entire former kitchen in it to Cincinnati
- my dad's willingness (read reluctance) to store an entire kitchen in his office's basement for a couple years
- my parent's remodel of their own countertops and replacement sink
- my dad's ability to reassemble said cabinets and hang them
- glue
- measuring 5 times before we cut
- and some sore knees

Putting this kitchen together again after this unlikely assembly of building materials was a feat that all began with hanging the upper kitchen cabinets to get them out of our way for the flooring.

Glad my dad knew to screw them all together first before lifting them onto a temporary cleat mounted level on the wall and then screwing them in for good. We were extra careful to draw the stud lines on the wall and mark where not to screw to avoid pipes.

Next was installing the flooring throughout the entire apartment. This is where the sore knees, and I should have added thumbs too, come into play.



FYI Turns out that using tape to hold them down wasn't needed if you put the tapping block along side it and give it some solid whacks. #we'reNOOBS



Can't argue with the results. It really added some pop to the apartment.

Now with the flooring down we screwed the cabinets together to act as a work surface for the countertops. We had multiple pieces of salvaged counter tops that weren't quite long enough to use for the full span. so the trick was to glue them together using these bolts that were routed into the bottom in order to secure it into one large piece to work with.



After fusing them together on top of the cabinets in the middle of the kitchen, we moved the cabinets into place and screwed them to the wall carefully (again avoiding pipes). We then moved the countertop into position with one last crucial cut to make, the sink hole.

A lot of arguing and posturing took place, but I was dead set on not making any cut until we were 1000% sure it was right. Eventually we got there and prayed that the opening would fit right and not hit the cabinet frames. Somehow we didn't screw this up!

We mounted the sink, hooked up the plumbing, and the put the cabinet doors back on. Then we stood back and it looked pretty good. We even took part of the scrap countertop and turned it into a makeshift backsplash.

Uncle Tom would be proud to eat in this kitchen.