Kitchen Renovation - What made yours less stressful?

[violetbunny]

Please share your tips on what made your kitchen renovation less stressful!

We are having our kitchen ripped out and replaced in the new year. We are using a kitchen company who will organise the various tradespeople to come in at the right time, which should make things easier, although total process will take around 4 weeks to complete.

Our kitchen/living space is open plan, so I've purchased a floor-to-ceiling dust barrier that will hopefully help protect the living space. Planning to move the fridge, dining table, microwave etc into the spare room and use as a makeshift kitchen.

What things made your renovation easier? E.g. for food prep, looking after pets (we have 2 cats), keeping on top of the chaos?

I wish I knew the answer.
We’re on week nine of no kitchen due to extend/kitchen being fitted. Having no hob or sink really threw us.

We borrowed an electric camping hob from a friend. We had
Lots of meals in the freezer ready to be put in the microwave.

I lowered my standards that we wouldn’t/ couldn’t eat meals made from scratch.
The dust will get everywhere so be prepared to
Clean much more frequently and to wipe down plates before you serve food on them.

We used camping tables as a make shift worktop and insisted on the washing machine remaining in situ so clothes could be washed from home.

Tell yourself a thousand times a day that it will be worth it 🤦🏼‍♀️

Eating out a lot, going to friends and in laws…microwave rice pouches. Having washing machine plumbed in hall, with a v long hose for the water. Gritted teeth.

And portable induction hob.

We went on holiday.....

Do it in the summer so you can use a gas bbq for mealtimes.

Assume it will take a minimum of 8 weeks and plan accordingly.
Dont spend much time at home during the working day.

Box up and store as much as you can from the living room and cover sofas with poly sheets. The dust will get through
Always shut every door in the house
Buy a cheap vacuum cleaner to deal with plaster dust and assume you will throw it away at the end of the renovation.
Electricity and plumbing will be switched on and off during the day and unless you are very specific occasionally overnight
Dont let them start until they have every item on hand. With supply chain issues you dont want the old kitchen ripped out to the be told the sink now has a two month wait list
Pick everything now and dont change you mind!

The lack of a sink is the worst. If you have a utility try and keep this clear and easy to use. We made the mistake of moving all our kitchen stuff in there, and trying to use the sink around everything is absolute chaos.

Expect it to take twice as long and cost twice as much. I’m not saying that to wind you up but the lower your expectations are the less it will bite when stuff goes wrong.

I created a safe space for my cat in a spare room, and coaxed him in there before work started. He tends to sleep in one spot for a while and then shift to a new spot so was content to adopt this one. I let him out to roam after the builders left in the evenings. He really dislikes strangers and people in the house so this routine worked fairly well to minimise the stress for him, but probably would drive another cat mad.

Meet with the builders every morning. I know MN frowns on making tea, but it’s a great way to have a chat without it feeling official, and you can talk through issues while they’re still small things.

Always, always, always ask “how much is that going to cost?” when anyone suggests any deviation from the plan no matter how minor, or reasonable it sounds. This phrase is the key to keeping within your budget.

Keep reminding yourself that it will be over one day.

We went away for the first week (ripping out, re-plastering and first-fix plumbing and wiring). Cats were put in a cattery. This was an good move.

We are open plan too but the dust only went into the adjoining room and wasn't too bad at all.

We moved table and chairs, fridge-freezer and microwave to the front room (kitchen is at the back). We thought we'd BBQ a lot but it was such a faff as instead of being able to pop back in to grab tongs, ketchup, stuff from the fridge, you had to traipse all the way back through the house. Also the fitters had stuff all over the patio a lot of the time. The kitchen table was not big enough to act as crockery store, table and work-surface. We ended up eating a lot of takeaways and eating out too.

Another tip is to try and make sure you are there when the tradespeople arrive each morning to run through any details and talk through anything you have questions about from the previous day's work. Leave them a folder with copies of all the plans, your phone numbers, paint colours, anything like that and take a duplicate copy to work with you in case you need to sort anything during the day.

If you are at home during the day there will be noise, power off at times etc, on the odd day I was WFH I had to relocate to the farthest room in the house for Teams meetings.

Get a slow cooker. Only needs a plug and so can be set up anywhere as part of your makeshift kitchen and doesn't take up much room. Much better than endless microwave meals or takeaways. You can bung stuff in it in the morning and then just do rice / pasta / bread to serve.

I stocked up freezer with homemade meals and everything was served with baked potato or microwave rice or salad.
We moved small combi oven /microwave from old kitchen into dining room along with ikea portable induction hob.
Zip up dust doors are brill.
I coped fine with washing dishes in bathroom or utility but I really missed my washing machine. I went round to MIL once a week and did several l9ads

Ahhh thanks so much for all the advice! Noting many of these down.

I'm not in the UK, it's summer here so we can use our gas BBQ. I already have a slow cooker and multicooker, so will look to use these and will investigate getting a hot plate and air fryer.

Washing machine is plumbed in up the hall and we have a utility sink we can use for dishes thank goodness.

All our major appliances will be delivered before Xmas, but good tip to check that they have everything else they need before they start...! I'd rather postpone than have to live with no kitchen for months.

I will give some consideration to putting the cats in a cattery. One of them really hates it (to the point he nearly made himself ill last time he went in). However I am concerned how much dust, noise and crap will be generated on the 1st day especially - we have a massive thick concrete bench top which needs to be smashed to smithereens in order to remove it. I might just put the cats in the cattery for the first day until the worst of it is over.

Yes do check everything is ready, a friend has got everything except a couple of integrated appliances which have been on back order for weeks and she's getting really fed up with the delays (luckily can go to parents for washing etc).

Once our cats came back from the cattery they tended to just stay upstairs during the day (but they do that anyway).

Use that sticky floor protector stuff that comes on a roll to protect anywhere the builders may walk or where dust may land (everywhere)

We had a portable induction hob and cooked outside sometimes, but mine was June time and we used the BBQ too. We also had a temporary kitchen set up with a microwave and a slow cooker. We bunked the children in together and used one of their rooms for all the kitchen cupboard contents.

I know you have a utility with a sink but we had two washing up bowls to put into the bath. One transports all the dirty dishes and the other you fill up to wash. We did also use disposable plates and bowls at times to make life easier.

Have a picture up of what it will be like at the end so you know why you are putting yourself through this.

Get the decorators to paint the kitchen after it is plastered and before the fitters install anything, far easier than painting around the cabinets when it is finished.

If you haven't already invest in a shop vacuum cleaner (wet and dry) so any dust doesn't kill yours. We have one from Screwfix for £50 but you aren't in the UK so I don't know what you can access. It has been used a million times since for any DIY jobs etc.

Definitely second the portable induction hob and the sticky dust sheets. We did ours earlier in the year and what was planned as a 5 week job took closer to 9. Also think about the cattery. Our cat was fine the first few weeks, but when they started to make lots of drilling and sawing noises he was beside himself and we ended up sending him there for the final few weeks.

@OnTheBenchOfDoom

Use that sticky floor protector stuff that comes on a roll to protect anywhere the builders may walk or where dust may land (everywhere)

We had a portable induction hob and cooked outside sometimes, but mine was June time and we used the BBQ too. We also had a temporary kitchen set up with a microwave and a slow cooker. We bunked the children in together and used one of their rooms for all the kitchen cupboard contents.

I know you have a utility with a sink but we had two washing up bowls to put into the bath. One transports all the dirty dishes and the other you fill up to wash. We did also use disposable plates and bowls at times to make life easier.

Have a picture up of what it will be like at the end so you know why you are putting yourself through this.

Get the decorators to paint the kitchen after it is plastered and before the fitters install anything, far easier than painting around the cabinets when it is finished.

If you haven't already invest in a shop vacuum cleaner (wet and dry) so any dust doesn't kill yours. We have one from Screwfix for £50 but you aren't in the UK so I don't know what you can access. It has been used a million times since for any DIY jobs etc.

We also bought a wet dry vac, well worth it.

One tip that came up on renovation thread when we were having ou kitchen done was checking appliances when delivered.
The poster (in 2019) advised AGAINST getting your appliance too early as she found faults /damage when they were finally installed and had quite a bother getting supplier to replace them as they were outside the usual 30 day period for highlighting problems.
However that was when supply chain was robust, in 2021 you can't leave it as late as possible unless you are willing to end up waiting 6 months for an oven.
So if you get your appliances before Xmas but they might not be installed until February, check them out after delivery. Obviously Consumer Law may vary in your own country.

We're just coming into the final week of ours (Week 5) and it hasn't been as bad as I expected, even though there have been one or two problems (leaks etc)
We have an excellent builder who communicates well and discussed things very sensibly.
We moved our temporary kitchen to a spare bedroom - kettle, toaster, microwave, and wash up in the bathroom. We're only using the en suite as a bathroom for the time being.
The builder uses the back door - we use the french windows. It means we can shut that side of the house of completely when he's here.
Draught excluders have helped to keep the dust down.
The cats have been ok (my big worry) with the help of Lick e Lix and some calming drugs from Pet Supermarket.
It will end - the builder said 5 weeks, and 5 weeks it will be. Then I have to decorate!

Oh, I made 18 home made microwaveable meals before we started. We have a small freezer in the garage. We live rurally, so no take aways anywhere near, but we have eaten well.

@WhereDoesThisToiletGo Thanks, this is a really good point! The kitchen company advised us to order them now as some of their customers' appliances were not arriving until February due to shipping delays. I think they will still be under warranty by the time they're due to be installed, but I will check.

@FuzzyPuffling

Oh, I made 18 home made microwaveable meals before we started. We have a small freezer in the garage. We live rurally, so no take aways anywhere near, but we have eaten well.

That's very well organised! I wish we had the freezer space to do that! I think I could probably do a bit of a freezer clear out over Xmas and make some space for some home cooked ready meals though.

First one went out for dinner every night second one went on holiday and left builder (trusted friend) to it.

We ate everything in the freezer in the lead up so there was room for the ready meals.

Today the flooring people are in laying our Karndean stuff. Nearly there, nearly there.....

I went on holiday for the first 10 days and the cat went to a Cattery and then stayed with a friend for the following week (she is nervous). It took about another 4 weeks to finish so 6 weeks total. Flooring took another month due to supply and demand issues.