Installing Ikea cabinets in all three of our beach house kitchens has made us wonder: why didn’t we use them in our Richmond kitchen? This week we dig into that question—what gave us pause back then, how Ikea cabinets might have changed our final result, and which cabinet choice we’d make today if we were selecting for our Richmond kitchen. We also share how a simple outdoor task at the duplex turned into a major plumbing problem (yes, the water curse strikes again) and why we had an emergency electrician call one night for good measure.
You can also find this episode on your favorite podcast app, including Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, TuneIn Radio, Stitcher, and Spotify.
What’s New
- That message was exactly what I texted Sherry when I realized one of the water shutoff valves at the duplex had been buried. You can see the exposed valve in the foreground; the other one should’ve been about four feet ahead of it. I dug for a while and couldn’t find it.
- We knew the valve was buried deeper than the others, but the next photo shows how deeply it ended up when the pathway was installed. Once the path was in, the top of the valve box sat around four inches below ground level. It was also so close to the path that some plastic edging pieces blocked access to the cover.
- I didn’t take pictures while digging because I didn’t expect anything noteworthy to happen—then the water line broke. The photo below shows some of the aftermath; the little box (the “margarine tub”) sits removed from the hole in the background and the lid is set to the right.
- This close-up shows the break at the base of the pipe. It wasn’t large, but it released a surprising amount of water very quickly. The pipe didn’t become visible until the water drained, which left a messy, muddy scene.
- The plumber fixed it and re-set the box a bit higher so the top is now level with the ground. That prevents it from being buried again and positions it farther from the path, solving both problems.
- If you missed our past water misadventures in Cape Charles, here are a few episodes that cover the history: Episode #59 (when we were told the beach house lacked a water line and adding one could cost $10,000 or more), Episode #81 (pipes freezing and the “Duplex Waterfall of 2018”), Episode #97 (a broken, leaking duplex water meter), and Episode #110 (uncovering a long-hidden bathroom leak during a remodel).
That’s Embarrassing
- We’ve made a lot of progress on the beach house backyard that deserves a full photo story, but for now here’s a peek at the lights on the sheds that caused us so much trouble.
- We used the 11″ versions of these lights on the sides of the shed and the back of the house, and the larger 15″ lights near the peak. The dusk-to-dawn sensor is subtle in photos, but you can spot a small nub at the top on the back side if you look closely on the product page.
Ikea Kitchens
- If you want a deeper dive into our Richmond kitchen remodel, check the posts that walk through the before-and-afters, the renovation process, the new layout planning, and five mistakes we made during the reno.
- Here are the projects where we used Ikea cabinetry, in order:
- Our Richmond laundry room—where we used filler pieces to create a wall-to-wall look and added a bottom piece to conceal the under-cabinet lighting. You can also read about installing those Ikea cabinets; they were the only cabinets (three uppers and one lower) we’d installed before planning our Richmond kitchen. The door style there is BODBYN.
- Our bonus room built-ins in Richmond used the same BODBYN fronts. We shared that project on the blog before the kitchen remodel because it came together faster, though the decision to hire a local cabinet maker for the Richmond kitchen had been made long before we tackled the bonus room built-ins.
- Our Cape Charles beach house kitchen was our first full kitchen using Ikea cabinets (door style VEDDINGE). You can see before-and-afters and read about how we planned and installed it in the posts dedicated to that project.
- This past winter we installed Ikea kitchens in both duplex units in Cape Charles. One set of doors is ASKERSUND, and the other kitchen’s blue cabinets are KALLARP. We laid out our tips, tricks, and the tools you’ll need if you want to install an Ikea kitchen yourself.
- One more kitchen detail: when Sherry mentioned our “appliance garage,” she meant an area our installers built using stock doors and filler pieces to look like a cabinet (it has no back). We stash breakfast foods and frequently used appliances like the toaster and crock pot there—open while in use, closed to hide them when not.
We’re Digging
- If you’re ready to jump back into our unofficial Creepy Murder Book Club, here are the two books I read over spring break: Watch Me Disappear by Janelle Brown and The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware.
- If you enjoyed Sherry’s “sexy fairy” recommendation of the Court of Thorns and Roses series, she’s now deep into Sarah J. Maas’ Throne of Glass series. She started with book one and has already made it to book five.
If you want to find something we mentioned in a past episode but can’t remember which show notes to open, we keep a master list of everything we’ve been digging from previous episodes, plus a Book Club page with all our recommendations.
Lastly, thanks to Annie Selke for sponsoring this episode. Check out their latest collaboration with artist Laura Park and use code YHL15 for 15% off your order.
Thanks for listening!
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