Adventures in Remuddling

The mini kitchen makeover starts.

The upper cabinets got the heave-ho. That part was easy. First I removed the upper crown molding, chipped away the caulk surrounding the wood, then unscrewed the cabinet from the wall. If I had more foresight, I would have gotten a helper to stabilize the cabinet as I removed the last screw that was holding it in place (the cabinets are quite heavy). Unfortunately, I was alone when the cabinet quickly dropped to the counter. No harm done, though.

As you can see, the space immediately opened up.

Now let’s take a look at the space:

• The wall was lime green before, and it probably wasn’t primed before it became pink. I’ll need to Kilz it good.
• There’s a wooden nailing strip for the upper cabinet moulding that needs to be removed. Okay, I can handle that.
• Joint compound was never applied to the corner where the 2 walls meet, a sign of poor quality worksmanship.
• A chunk of drywall is missing from the ceiling. Hhmmm, this is starting to look like more work than I thought.
• Lastly, there are wires growing through the wall like a weed and disappearing into the ceiling (see below). Ugh, this means I have to do electrical work…Wait! I get to do electrical work. Woohoo!

According to the kitchen mini makeover to do list, there’s no electrical work to be done (light fixture excluded) and I couldn’t convince the wifey to put in ethernet ports or a TV. But now with these wires obviously in the wrong place, I have to do a little electrical work. Nothing big, mind you. Just some wire fishing and re-routing through the attic.

Those 3 wires are probably for the switch below. To be on the safe side, I physically traced them and confirmed they led to the switch box below. After a few hours of shuttling back and forth to the attic and fishing wire…

Ta da! No more unsightly wires.