Granite? Who Needs Granite!

Many months ago, while just in the planning stages for the kitchen, we picked out the world's most expensive granite (we didn't know it at the time). As we were trying to reduce the price tag on the kitchen, we opted to go with silestone, a quartz composite that is more environmentally friendly and allegedly better than granite (even though it does not have the chi-chi value that granite does). It was also the original counter material we wanted (before falling in love with the previously mentioned granite).

NOW, we look wise beyond our years! Yesterday's New York Times article about radon seems to have started a firestorm of granite warnings (maybe it wasn't the NYT article that started, but that's what started it for me!). If you haven't heard about the granite-cancer connection, check out the Times story and this Washington Post blog.

While I am totally using this to make us look smart, this will probably get filed in the same category as "saccharin and Nutrasweet might give you cancer," but we all drink it anyway. In the meantime, however, lots of soccer moms are going to be very stressed!

FINALLY... some new pics!

Sorry for the long delay in posting... we meant to update over the holiday weekend, but getting the house back together seemed a bit more important.

SO, the pics below illustrate and almost done kitchen. The pendant lights are still on back order and painting won't be done until the end of the month, but it looks pretty much what it is going to look like and we love it! And most of our stuff has found it's new home in the cabinets.

The plumber was here again yesterday so we finally have working ice maker/filtered water to drink.




The hood went in early last week and the exhaust fan nearly blew us away as it is really powerful.

What a week!

So we apologize for the lack of photographic updates to the blog.  It's been quite a week.  We survived the Great Israeli Countertop Scandal of 2008 and have suddenly found ourselves with a functioning kitchen!

The counters went in last Thursday.  The backsplash tile also went in last Thursday.  On Friday the plumber came to hook up the appliances. (Sadly, he had to come back on Saturday -- but that's neither here nor there.)  The plumber should be coming back on Monday to hook the water/ice line up for the fridge and to put our much-needed heat in.   At some point, the electrician needs to come back to finish the lights.  The hood also needs to be put up. We assume that's happening in the very near future.

But as you can see -- we've got a kitchen!  The pictures don't quite do it justice.

We have counters!

We apologize for the lack of pictures, but we are happy to report that we do in fact have countertops!

And, we love the last minute substitution more than the original one we picked out.

Fingers crossed that our appliances go in today. We will post pictures over the weekend!

Countergate

So hopefully, countergate is coming to an end. We met with Joe on Tuesday morning, to select new counters. Needless to say, we're sticking with non-Israeli counters, as apparently the counter top industry in Israel is in the middle of a crisis. Oy vey.

Anyhow -- we've moved onward to a coffee brown silestone, a material which which should match the kitchen quite well. Apparently, it's somewhat environmentally friendly quartz. The current plan is for the counters to be installed on Thursday, with the plumber coming on Friday to get us functional.

Why you should always buy American...

So if you've been keeping track, things have gone very smoothly with the kitchen, except for the countertops. The plot thickened today when we found out that the replacement for the original material had a similar streak in it as the first. Turns out, the material is fabricated in Israel. So if we want to wait for a fresh piece, we're talking 6 to 9 months. Thus, tomorrow we will pick out a new countertop.

Not to sound like a broken record...

But we are really at a stand still now. The material for our counters was not up to snuff when the company received it so they are not going to fabricate the counters with it. Which means about another week. SO sad. But it's still been less stressful than we thought so we can't complain that much (Dan, who was the messenger of this news this morning, however, might disagree with the concept of me not complaining about it!).

Update... Sort of.

So we've hit our first set back - the counters, which were supposed to go in yesterday (Monday), are delayed until Thursday, so we are really at a stand still now. That said, we are hoping the plumber can hook everything up Friday so that we are at least functional while other finish work takes place. There is a little more electrical to do, but we are close on that front as well.

Sorry for the lack of pics, but there really isn't much noticeable change to photograph. (BRAND NEW MOLDING just doesn't really come through the computer!) Stay tuned, but probably no updates until Thursday night.