Kitchen Refit survival tips needed.

[bushtailadventures]

We are having our kitchen done soon, apparently it will take 2-3 weeks.How do we cope? No washer, no cooker, everything piled in the living room.

I figure we will just have to eat a lot of ready meals, and make clothes last an extra wear or 2, but is there anything else I've not thought of? Any advice will be welcome, we have never had work done on this scale before.

Have you got a bathroom operational for washing up?
Take laundry to friends or launderette (Pay them back with lovely meal when new kitchen is done).

You need to make a mini kitchen somewhere else in the house, e.g. lounge.
Plug in fridge and set up a table with essentials for making breakfasts, tea, sandwiches etc. If you have a microwave plug that in too. Can you keep a couple of the old kitchen unit carcases (wall units maybe) to stack up for temporary storage?

You could get a plug in hob or mini oven, we had 3 months of work so it was worth it but for just a few weeks I might try and manage with the microwave and maybe a camping cooker.

Watching this thread as in a few weeks this will be us too. Although as we are doing it ourselves it'll be more like 4-6 weeks. 😳

I plan to do a huge cook off before we collapse the kitchen. Things like spag bol, casseroles etc and freeze them so we have some home made meals. I can't stomach the though of ready made meals for that long.

Oh and plan to lots of baked potatoes in the microwave for lunches and dinners too.

We are several weeks into a new kitchen extension. We have now been without any facilities in the kitchen for a week. Up to this point they had managed to keep a working sink and oven going, though virtually no prep area.

We picked up a mini fridge at a car boot for £10 in readiness - it's great to have milk available indoors for hot drinks / cereal, rather than have to squeeze into the garage amongst all the white goods being stored there.

I have the mini fridge, microwave and the kettle on top of that, all standing on a small cupboard in the lounge - it's all been doable and not too traumatic. For the sake of 2 weeks, I've bought a load of disposable plastic cutlery, plates and cups. Washing up in the downstairs toilet is not doable in MHO.

We also put a fund away for eating out. We are near a Weatherspoons and the 4 of us can eat out for £20 ( main meal deal and soft drinks only). You get to the point where you really want a decent meal with some proper vegetables.

We have stuff everywhere ,throughout the entire house. I really think attitude of mind is getting us through. Just accept it's going to be chaotic for a while and laugh about it anyway.

We are off to stay at my mum's this weekend. I'm taking essential washing with me. Next week, I'll have to go and see how a launderette works!

Hardest bit has really been to get two teenage DS to be tidier than normal. They can't leave shoes, coats, empty wrappers etc on floor when there's barely any floor to walk on.

Good luck with your kitchen build.

I was a teenager so mum and dad dealt with the admin but:
Microwave, kettle, toaster and fridge.
Paper plates and glasses and cutlery.
Go away for the weekends - time to visit friends/relations.
Eat out.
Eat easy food.
Don't make life hard for yourself.

We had an extension done about 6 months ago which meant we had no kitchen for about 6 weeks. My youngest was 14 months at the time and still crawling so it was hellish as he wanted to be in where the builders were all the time. Builders would leave tools in other areas too so it was really dangerous.

Because they started at 7am everyday we ate out for breakfast at Tesco cafe on the days I wasn't at work. I ate at work on the three days I worked. We put the microwave in the living room but it was dangerous with the baby as there was nowhere high up to put it so he used to fiddle with it so I got rid of it in the end.
I had all these plans to use slow cookers and microwave meals so I put a post on Facebook for recipe inspiration which unintentionally led to my friends and family setting up a rota of who would feed us on which days. This was for five days a week at teatime. My dad did a beautiful buffet breakfast for us at his house every weekend and we ate takeaways or out for the other two days a week.

The problem is you have nowhere clean to prepare food and I couldn't even access my fridge so we had nothing more than cereal or cups of tea (the builders will pinch your kettle) the whole time.
Sorry I'm not much help, it'll be easier if you don't have a toddler, maybe you'll manage better than me. I'm just glad it's all over and now I'm sitting chilling in my beautiful kitchen extension watching the rain through the bifolds and it was all worth it!!

Oh and I remember trying to wash dishes in the bath upstairs! Just eat out!

I'm about to do this. It will involve the back of my apartment being sealed off, so I won't be able to access several large cupboards, a loo, the washing machine and dryer or the kitchen. It won't however take more than a week as the old fitted kitchen has already been removed and some preparatory plumbing and electricity has already been installed.

I shall eat in restaurants and send my clothes to the laundry!

Thank you all for the advice. I think I am going to treat it like when we went on self-catering holidays when the dc were little, as many convenience foods as possible with disposable tableware added. There are 5 adults in the house as well as toddler dvd so the thought of washing up everything in the bath is daunting to say the least.

Washing is still something to worry about, but I will cross that bridge when I come to it. No launderettes or family nearby, but we do have some lovely neighbours.

That should say 'toddler dgd' obviously, stupid autocorrect

Our kitchen refit took 3 weeks but we weren't without everything for all that time. We moved fridge freezer to living room & table with microwave, family grill (George foreman ) kettle & toaster.

We were only without a washing machine & sink fir a couple of days. Then could use at night when worked were finished