Here's the starting point of our renovation. This is what the kitchen looked like right after Christmas 2006. The wallpaper is almost completely gone. One of the shutters was still in place, but it's gone now too.

Kitchen Issues

• The oven is officially busted. The control circuit that runs the broiler is blown, although the element is ok. The temperature sensor is out of calibration so we have to watch the oven carefully.
• The fridge is barely holding on. It's on a freeze-thaw cycle that is driving us to distraction.
• The stove top has two elements have temperature sensors that function intermittently. The elements are solid-style, the precursors to ceramic radiant and induction types.
• The microwave/vent hood combination is actually just a clock with a 4" vent pipe.

Here's what the current kitchen looks like. The island is movable, and has an automatic tilt feature that's really good at dumping food on the floor when you lead on the edge. The layout is not bad, as a single chef kitchen, but that's not where we're going. But if you're really wondering why we're doing this, look at the bottom. It's a Holmes on Homes nightmare. At least the mice appear to have vacated years before we got the place. The oven, though, was a fire hazard. This renovation is a reminder to everyone that you should check out your builder very carefully, and that the buyer must always beware.

East View	Southeast View	Northeast View	North View
Bad Insulation	Burnt Oven Vent	Leftover Mice Peanut Shells

Building Issues

After we demolished the kitchen, what an interesting set of discoveries. The ducting wasn't sealed, so there was a lot of leakage. Huge amounts of money going, literally, out the side of the house. The vapour barrier was ripped during the initial kitchen installation, and no one bothered to fix it. Worse, the two supporting walls had no supports. They were resting on plywood. Who builds this crap anyway?

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