Here’s where it gets real. I was terribly stressed out over the Ikea delivery which weirdly was scheduled for a Sunday. The ape who called me to confirm our appt. put that unneeded drama in my head by telling me we will have 3 boxes that weighted 800lbs. Umm, okay Ikea is famous for their efficient packaging but a dishwasher, a sink, cabinets, countertops and a faucet condensed into 3 boxes sounds crazy, right? Plus our living room already looked like this.

Oh man, nothing makes you feel more of a Hoarder of junk than emptying out your cabinets.

Also the crew was moving all our appliances in the living room while they worked on the floors so we were running out of space. Antz and I thought we had two options, take everything out of the boxes and store them in the garage until our cabinet installation or put them on our deck and stand guard for 5 days so no one would steal them.

Turns out when the delivery guys showed up, they had more than three boxes and the heaviest box was the dishwasher. Nowhere near the 800lbs the guy on the phone told me.

These guys ran the boxes up and down our stairs like they were carrying feathers, I don’t know how they do it!

So crisis averted {LESSON LEARNED} Don’t spazz out unless you have to. I was being overly neurotic and sensitive. Most of the time things works out so being worried isn’t productive. Besides, the floors were stressful enough.

The floors!! Rene gave us such an incredible deal on all the other stuff we needed to get done that we were able to splurge on having our floors professionally refinished. It made sense to spend the money because A. we would have spent time and money just to ruin the floors ourselves, since we learned from a previous lesson, know when to hire a professional and B. with our Ikea new cabinets and all the work being done in the kitchen, why leave the floors looking crappy?

Then I got a call from Rene {LESSON LEARNED} When you get a call from your contractor, it’s usually bad news. He told us our 90 year old floors were done. There was no way he could refinish them in their condition. He then pushed the dark clouds away and brought in the sunshine and told us he would install brand new hardwood floors for the same price as the refinish job. Rene can in fact make miracles happen!

Our floors before *real horrorshow*

These guys were fast, they installed the floors in 6 hours

They smelled so nice too!

The new floors did push our schedule back a week. We had to allow the wood to settle so we got to live with unfinished floors for some time. During that time we finally chose a wall color.

I wanted pure white walls for a cleaner look

Antz was right, we needed some contrast from the white trim so I love the Whetstone Grey color he chose. I am so happy Rene fixed our bumpy old plaster walls. Now they are as smooth as a baby’s bottom.

We got a fresh coat of chalkboard paint too

I almost started falling in love with the idea of light floors *blame Pinterest*

Antz talked me out of keeping the floors light. So Friday morning the guys came back to stain the floors. I couldn’t peek through the doorway like usual since they had to seal the room, so I could only look through the windows from the back door.

Then I almost shit my pants when I saw this!

Now to their credit, we never really specified the shade of the floors with the floor guys, only Rene. I was adamant about them being dark but this looked too dark to me. The camera lighting isn’t showing it but all I saw BLAAAACK. I, of course begin to have a panic attack, texted Antz frantically, then called Aimee and began to cry. My beautiful new floors have been ruined. I was inconsolable. The guys working didn’t speak much English so while I’m showing them this photo on my phone and trying to communicate in Spanglish, all I could get across was “TOO DARK!” The guy was like, this is what you said you wanted, this is Ebony. No way, I do not like Ebony and I want them lighter right pronto! Finally Antz came home from work to calm me down and he told the guy we wanted more brown and a more warmer tone. I was ready to have them rip out the floors and start from scratch but the guys were giving me the side eye. He somehow got a light bulb over his head after talking to Rene on the phone and did this.

They were a little sloppy on my baseboards but they repainted them

YAY!! Holy cow, my heart left my throat and I finally chilled the fart out.

Shiny Happy People holding hands!!

{LESSON LEARNED} Know when to micromanage. I left the floors guys alone too long and it almost bit me in the ass. If I didn’t see the floors when I did we would have had the wrong color floors and not been happy with them. I wish the floor guys would have let me know they were ready to stain and showed me the color first, but it’s up to me to watch them more closely.

So after waiting 3 days my floors were dry and just perfect.

I am so happy we went dark. They really look rad. Now was finally time for the cabinet installation. We planned to use the company Ikea works with *Signature something-or-other* who came out for a quote. Ikea has a pricing guideline but when installing countertops they needed to see the space in person to give us a more detailed quote. I was visiting my Mom with Liv when the company came out for the quote but they guy was sure it would be close to our budget. Then I got an email which immediately gave me a stomachache. Double of what I planned to spend and they were charging us tax to install cabinets!! No freaking way! I went to Yelp and started looking for cabinet installers. That’s when I saw the Ikea installation company’s reviews. Not good, all one stars and everyone had a negative complaint about the poor work and the price gouge. I found a company with great reviews that gave me an over the phone estimate that was within my budget. {LESSON LEARNED} Do your research. I could have gone with the Ikea recommended company but I looked around and found someone much better on my own. Mike was fabulous. He built and installed everything beautifully, quickly and even built my island for me.

I still tipped them even though they rocked out to Bon Jovi while they worked *and it wasn’t Living on a Prayer either*

This was the only configuration we could come up to fit the tight space after weeks of planning at Ikea and I love how it turned out!

I had to get a single bowl sink instead of the double but it’s stellar

hello, love of my life!!

Can you believe this is my kitchen? I love it so much!!

Note to Ikea; make your island/carts come with optional casters. We had to buy ours from Home Depot and ask Rene to install them.

The finishing touches are coming soon. I’ll include a source list of all our goodies in the finale post. HAPPY HAPPY!!