Now it was time to start removing everything. We started by removing all the cabinets and moving them to the garage. We also put the refrigerator in the garage and hooked it up, including the ice maker, for extra food storage. Little did we know that we would need the storage during the Covid-19 pandemic. Having an ice maker was nice when it came around to the “happy hour”.
Cabinets removed. 
Breaking into the wall. 
Working my way down the wall. 
It is slow going. 
All the drywall down on this wall.
When we were done this is what we had.
Looking into the bathroom. 
Looking from the bathroom.
We found some strange things during demolition. If you look closely you can see that the water pipes in the corner come out of the wall, cut the corner, and then go back into the wall. There were many junction boxes buried in the walls. In the bottom picture notice the screw coming out of the coper water pipe
Pipes cutting across the corner. 
These are the 2 conduits that go to the island in a buried box. 
This is the 3rd conduit going to the island with wires in it.
Also in the ceiling there were three old style can lights. They were being replaced with nine of the newer dimmable LED lights. The best way to do this is make a square hole and then remove the can. Later I will install a patch in the hole.
What you don’t see in the pictures is I also removed all the electrical, water, and propane lines.
Above the sink we removed the drywall up to the ceiling as it was easier to just start over.
We also decided to remove all the wood floor. As you can see the wood has a padding and vapor barrier under it. As we have hydronic heating this was causing condensation to form. Eventually it would be causing mold. Also as we were installing tile floor the “mass” of the floor would help to store heat and cold to keep the house comfortable.
Now that everything had been removed it was time to rebuild. In the following articles I will explain our process.
