New kitchen sink

If you've been paying attention, you'll know that we've been doing some home improvement work from time to time. We were impressed when we moved in with how new and modern everything was. Well, in the time we've owned the house, we've more or less discovered or realized now that all of the work the previous owners did was all done with the cheapest, crappiest Home Depot junk money could buy. Now, we don't really have many complaints. We're not saying we were ripped off or anything. It's just that every time we've decided to redo something, we've been astounded at how much better it was after we were done. Case in point was our kitchen sink. We didn't like it because the bowls were rather small, weren't flat on the bottom, and because we had a dishwasher, we didn't really need a two bowl sink. Our garbage disposal was also very loud, and the reverse osmosis system would gurgle loudly too.

So we decided to buy a new sink. If you're going to bother buying a new sink, you might as well replace the garbage disposal while you're at it. We decided to go with an asymmetric two bowl design. The smaller bowl has the disposer in it, which sort of makes it the equivalent of a wet trash can, sort of.

This time we had a plumber come in and do the work. Not that I couldn't have done it, but it was a trade-off of time and money I was willing to make. While they were at it, we had them re-plumb the washing machine drain. It used to drain out on the lawn. Not kidding. I didn't think such an arrangement was even legal, much less good for the grass. They even added a clean-out just in case something ever clogs. We also added a proper air gap for the dishwasher.

We've had the whole set up for a few days now. There's only been one mishap. I ran some corn cobs down the disposer a little too quickly and one of them managed to get stuck in a way that blocked the dishwasher inflow. Oops. The disposer can actually take corn cobs. It's just that it's so quiet I wasn't able to distinguish between it being done or having one stuck. The disposer is actually a "compact" model, which means that it was easy to clear. One downside of it being so small is that you need to cut things like corn cobs in half before you send them down or else their top halves will spin around above the rubber drain cover and fling water all over.

So what's next?

Honestly, we're running out of easy stuff, but there are a couple left. We have some folding doors on the office closet that need to be replaced with sliding doors - or just simply removed. We could replace the master bath shower door, I suppose. We could replace the HVAC system, but I'm not sure there's enough gains to be made now that we've insulated. We could remodel the kitchen, but unless we make it larger it's probably not worth it. Then there's the "small" remodel idea (wall in the raised part of the patio as a kitchen extension), and then the "large" remodel (2nd story master suite and office).