Kitchen Remodel- Your Questions Answered

I really thought last week would be my last post about my kitchen remodel, however I received quite a few emails and comments about items in my kitchen. Many of the same questions were asked so, instead of answering each one I decided to turn it into a post. Sorry this is another long post, but I wanted to get them all into one post.

And this really should be the last post on my kitchen remodel.

Several of you asked about my kitchen faucet and what brand it was. It is a Delta and we got it at Lowes. When it came to my kitchen faucet I really did not care much about what I got.

I wanted it tall enough to fit large a large pot or containers under and I wanted a pull down spout, besides that I really did not have many thoughts on what I wanted. It is just a faucet after all, or so I thought.

My husband on the other hand is in the medical field and washes his hands all the time. It turns out he has a lot of thoughts on what makes a good faucet. So, I pretty much let him pick it out and I love it.

He liked the idea of having the handle on the side of the faucet. He said it would be much easier to turn on the faucet with messy hands etc. And he is right. It is one of the features I love about the faucet.

Several of you asked for more information about my counters. I went with quart and so far I love it. Some of you asked on the price per foot I paid for the counters. The thing I learned about quartz vs granite is that it really can vary. Low end granite may be cheaper than high end quartz.

I also learned that the price of quartz vs granite can really vary on where you live. Some parts of the US have a better supply of one vs the other and it can make the price vary quite a bit. The price of installation also really varies. So, this is an area where you just really have to research it where you live and what is available.

One thought I do have is on the color of the counters. I love the overall look and am very glad I choose it, but it does have some issues. My sister has really dark counters, similar to my new ones, and she warned me that they are a little hard to keep clean. And it is not really that they are hard to keep clean, they are hard to keep looking clean.

They tend to show streaks and more spots. I feel like am constantly needing to clean my counters. In reality I don’t think they are any cleaner or dirtier than my last counters, it is just I notice more on the dark shiny surface. Not a big deal, but something to think about when you are getting new counters.

A few of you also asked about my back splash tile area and what it was. It is a natural stone tile. It has texture and a lot of variance in the color which is why I liked it. I liked the contrast against the dark counter tops and how it brought out the lighter brown flecks in the quartz.

It was not cheap however. A regular glazed tile would have been cheaper, but for the over all look I wanted, the natural stone tile was worth it for me. And because I did not have a large area to do, the overall cost was really not that bad. I had the area behind my stove and one row of tile behind my sink and that was all. If I had a large area to cover, I might have chosen a cheaper option, but I am glad I had a small area because I love the look of it.

I also choose to go simple on the design of it. I could have had a pattern done or added in smaller tiles among the larger ones, but I liked the simple look and it kept the installation cost down. The one thing I did do was small grout lines. I asked them to place the tiles as close as they could to each other. I hate dirty, or dirty looking tile, so I love the very small grout lines.

I should have cleaned and dried my sink before I took a picture, but now at least you know what my sink looks like. And I will fully admit to moving a bunch of dirty dishes to the counter so I could take this picture. Keeping it real.

My sink is granite, I think it is called compressed granite, but I could be wrong on that. I love the look, the size, and how the sink functions. I love the fact that it is an under mount sink. I LOVE the fact that it fits a 9×13 pan. This is a little feature I did not realize until after the sink was installed and I had used it a few days. But the fact that a 9×13 pan fits flat on the left side is a feature I am loving when doing dishes.

Long term though I am not sure how I am going to love this sink. My last sink was this same material, but in a really light natural type color. I hated that sink. Not because of the material really, but the color. It stained terrible and then I would clean and scrub and a day later it looked dirty again.

When I was looking at sinks for my new kitchen though I learned a big reason why I probably did not like the sink was my own fault. You see I bleached my sink and that is a no no when it comes to the granite type sinks. A big no no. It messes with the finish and pits the sink causing more staining and issues.

So, it turns out every time I was using any sort of bleach product on my sink to remove the stained dirty look, I was actually making the problem worse and causing the staining to continue to get worse. Basically I ruined the finish on the sink and I had no idea I had done that.

Now I know and bleach has not touched my new sink and I am hoping I continue to love it. I will admit I am finding this hard, especially when I deal with certain foods, but their are other ways to clean besides bleach type products, so I am working on figuring out what I like best to clean my new sink. If you have thoughts on what you like I would love to hear.

And finally to answer questions about my fridge. Did you know it is a hard to get a good picture of a shiny black fridge?! If you look really close at the reflection in the fridge you will see peaches sitting on the floor. Again keeping it real for you all. 🙂

I did not replace the fridge when I redid the kitchen, but it is fairly new. We bought it less than two years ago, so I wanted to answer the questions on it.

When we bought it, I did not do a lot of research into refrigerators, mainly because I did not have time. My fridge went out several days after Christmas when it was stocked full of food. And a few days before I was having a large group of people over to my house for New Years Eve. It also happened to be one of my husband’s busiest work weeks of the year and he did not have time to help me shop for a new fridge.

We do have a small fridge in the garage, but it would have been very hard to make do with it for long.

Although I did not have a lot of time to research refrigerators before I went looking, I quickly found out that the end of December is a great time to buy an appliance. Not many people are appliance shopping around the holidays and most stores want to clear out as much inventory as they can before the end of the year.

So, the fridge I got was basically because I got a good deal on it and was in a hurry to buy one. I do love it though.The color is black because black was cheaper than stainless and since I don’t mind black, I went with it.

I am not a big fan of side by side fridges. Both the fridge and freezer are too narrow for me. I have never liked the ones I had. The feature I do love about side by sides though is the ice and water in the door.

The one thing I love about this fridge is I still have ice and water in the door, but it is not a traditional side by side. Love that!

The freezer is the large pull out drawer in the bottom and I really like that. It can be a deep dark place for things to get lost in, but since it is not my main freezer, I don’t find that to be a huge issue. It also stores quite a bit.

Since the fridge is what you get into the most, I love having it all at eye level. So having the freezer on the bottom works well for me.

I also love the small pull out drawer in the middle. At first I kind of thought it was a waste and I was not sure I would use it much, but we use it all the time. I keep things like string cheese, yogurt, lunch meat, etc in it that we use a lot or things we often just grab and go. I have found that this keeps us from opening the main part of the fridge as much, so it works great for snack type items.

I think that answered all your questions. If you have more leave a comment and I will do my best to answer them. Next week we will be back to What Is It Wednesday.