Behind the DIY Kitchen Remodel: What No One Tells You

Kitchen Chronicles II: Behind Our DIY Kitchen Renovation: What No One Tells You About Remodeling an Older Home

Renovating a kitchen in an older home is never as simple as the internet makes it look. If you’ve been following our Kitchen Chronicles, you already know this remodel has been full of surprises, lessons, and “well, that wasn’t supposed to happen” moments. Today I’m sharing the behind‑the‑scenes reality — the things no one tells you before you start a DIY kitchen renovation.

Whether you’re planning your own remodel or just love following along with ours, here’s what really happens when you take on a kitchen in a vintage home.

Current situation, see below. 

What We Expected vs. What Really Happened

You know, writing about this kitchen has been the most difficult thing for me to write about. You would think I would have so much to say, and I do, but getting my words to paper has been hard. Some of my readers may feel like I’ve disappeared from recipes and normal upcycling projects, and I understand that. But the truth is — if you’ve never renovated before, it’s very hard to understand what people actually go through when they do.

Trust me, I used to think, well, they know what they are doing or they would not have tried it. I laugh now, we have no idea what we are doing, but that didn't stop us from deciding to give this the old college try. 

I’m used to projects being hired out. Someone else handled the steps. The demo. The mess. The million little things that come before the final reveal.

This? 

Well, it's all sitting on our shoulders. We have to keep the momentum going, and keep this train on it's tracks, totally different animal than what I am used to.

Why We Chose to DIY This Kitchen

Some wonder why we decided to do this when everything else has been completed by others? Well, after some of the work that we've had done here, I no longer want to rely on others, I have to tell you, we also do good work. 

I guess we are not willing to have dripping paint on the walls in our kitchen, or all the beat up woodwork that was left behind upstairs, or the many other things that happened that shouldn't have. 

All the damage that was done to our home when the roof was replaced. Don't worry, I have enough pictures of a before and after to back up that statement. That's the plus of being a blogger, there are always a million and one pictures of the before and after. You cannot argue with a photo, time and date stamped, keep that in mind when you begin any remodeling projects in your home. 

Remember when I shared my husband said it would be on us if something did not turn out? Well, we are taking that to heart.    

The Emotional Rollercoaster of a DIY Remodel

One friend tells me it will all be worth it in the end, another says for me to give ourselves grace, yet another says what are you doing? Yeah, well.... I often wonder why this isn't moving faster myself. 

There are a lot of moving parts to a remodel, and we were not really sure where to begin. We thought we were handling this in a way that made the most sense to us. We began with the island piece I shared a few weeks ago, and then I thought I can totally handle cabinets. As you know, I paint things all of the time.

Only when it came to painting cabinets, I was flustered as I have shared before. The old oil based stain did not mesh with the paint despite the fact I sanded down to raw wood, and then adding primer and the paint last just left a mess. 

Now, I am not going to tell you I am a perfect painter, but I do not think I do a bad job. Can I just share that I should have began with the over the stove cabinets. not one I use daily. The over the stove cabinets were really over the fridge cabinets, short squatty boxes that never made sense. It has been that way since we moved here, and so it stayed that way for 12 years.

Lessons Learned About Older Cabinets

For anyone new here: If you have an older home with older cabinets, chances are oil based stain or paint was used, which means it is best for you to stick with oil based products again. I wish I could have told you that I figured this out early on, but it actually took me a month to figure out. Oh, I know, I Googled away and nothing told me about this little hiccup. Goes to show you that AI is only as smart as the questions you ask. Talk about frustration.

A contractor told me that I should not reuse our cabinets, but if you read Kitchen Chronicles I then you know we actually have nice cabinets, and why pay for new when the old was perfectly fine? It is just the way I think, not everyone has the same outlook on life as I do, but I appreciate all of our differences the same. Imagine if the world was made up of clones, life would be pretty boring, or that is my opinion anyway. 

So, when I finally made progress, I was jumping for joy, I wanted to get those cabinets back up on the wall immediately, and share them with you. 

Guess what? 

You cannot put the cabinets back up until you have had the electrical finished, and then you also need to have the ceiling repairs completed before the cabinets go back up... so... another lesson in kitchen renovating and sharing, you have to go backwards before you can go forwards. 

Why DIY Kitchen Renovations Move Slowly 

I can certainly see how other bloggers have struggled in sharing their kitchens with us over the years when they decided to take on a kitchen remodel. 

Then you have people coming in and saying you have to do this, and then that, but not before that, comes this. I have certainly felt like I have been roaming around a Dr. Suess book for about a month now. A perpetual maze of hitting that wall in the maze over and over and over again.

You may be thinking why is she telling me all of this? 

Well, I am on a emotional rollercoaster at the moment. I am frustrated. This is the internet, and some folks have to let you know what they think. 

Do you see where I am going here? 

I am doing the best I can — and some days, that has to be enough.

Before & After Moments

The Basement Situation 

Here is the current situation in the basement. I cannot find my crafting supplies, we had to move everything in our basement so they had room to change out the waterlines. Everything is stacked up in the center of the basement rooms. 

Cleaning out a loved ones home later becomes your mess, our basement is full. I do not have a space to work. The list goes on and on.   

Cabinets: The Project That Wouldn't End

When I finally figured out the cabinet fiasco, I completed all of the uppers. We did decide to remove the panels from our cabinet doors and try something new. I have to say, I think they will look perfect when they are completed. We just feel there are bigger fish to fry before we get into detail work. 

I do not have a completed kitchen cabinet to share with you since they are all just boxes, no fronts sitting in our dining room where I could find space. We even have some out in our garage awaiting their placement.

Backsplash Removal Drama

I removed our backsplash, and since I am sharing times, etc... it took me about two hours to remove the entire backsplash with a spackle scraper and a hammer. I simply pushed the spackle scraper down either in a corner of the tile, or the top and tapped it with the hammer. They came off in one piece.

Now, I will tell you I found this adhesive left behind. We had a friend from school come over who works in construction, he told us the adhesive likely contained asbestos, which stopped me in my tracks.

If you have been here over the last few years then you know I have severe respiratory issues, severe asthma, along with other issues. 

My heart dropped. 

I wore my mask when I initially got started, but I removed it when things were going swimmingly. 

Darn it. 

Now what? 

I had planned to sand the adhesive down on the wall. Well, you cannot do this, the fibers will go out into the air. 

Another professional came in, and said yep, you do not want to disturb that. The fibers never settle, they are constantly being stirred up, they get on your clothes, even if you wear a mask, when it's removed, the fibers will float in the air and down into the lungs they go. 

Talk about a gut punch.

So, the suggestion we received was to skim coat over it and then put our backsplash up. Well, we are not even close to being ready for this task, so it is on the backburner for now.

Soffit Removal & What We Found

Next up was the removal of the soffits. 

If you have a professional come in, they can have it down in probably an hour. They will hit it with sledgehammers, and down it will come. But due to my health issues, we decided it was best if we slowly removed the soffit which consisted of my husband standing on my childhood stool with an oscillating tool cutting into where the soffit met the ceiling. I was standing right along beside him on a ladder with the shop vac sucking up all of the drywall dust with my respirator mask on.

This was a three day job for us. 

Yeah, I get it, who knew, right? 

We do need to take a different, slower approach and cannot go gang busters when it comes to demo. I value my health more than this kitchen or sharing what we are doing in a timely fashion here.

I am sorry for those who do not feel this kitchen is moving along more quickly than it is. Imagine living in this mess. Emotions are high here, I feel as if I am wading around in quick sand. 

Once we cut into one piece of the soffit and took it down, we found wires. Now, some have told me I should have been prepared I would discover something behind those soffit walls, but no, that was not the original 1950 kitchen, it was a 1980 something remodel.

Our original pine kitchen cabinets are still in the basement, and they went all the way to the ceiling. So, no, I did not even consider there would be wires up there. I certainly did not expect this pig-tailed mess of wires being woven in and out of our walls. 

Who even does this?

I knew I had to get an electrician here STAT. 

The wires were hot since they were running electric to two can lights in our soffit over the peninsula. I taped off the light switch so we would not forget this was not something we wanted to turn on. 

Electrical Issues 

When you need someone and fast to show up, you turn to Google for a little help. I found someone who said he could come out the following day. Whew... he told us that as long as the switch was off, electric was not running to it. 

Now, I worked at the electric company for over a decade, so I know power is still running to it, it is just not engaged until the light switch is turned on. That still doesn't make one want to mess around those wires, but we finished the soffit removal and were doing our happy dance. We just did not know what all was in store for us yet.

The electrician was to come last Monday, when he showed up, he did not have his tools with him, they were in his other vehicle. He left and said he would be back, only I received a text message saying he will be back on Wednesday. Wednesday he had a family emergency, so he would be here on Friday.    

We had plans for Friday, but we changed everything so we could get this ball rolling. Friday was not long enough to complete all of the work, so I was told he would be back the following Thursday. 

The electric was turned off to the back half of our kitchen which also took out power to our garage, but we did not find this out until he was long gone Friday. So we have not been able to access our garage since then. 

Plumbing Surprises

In the meantime, plumbing has been changed out from galvanized to pex all throughout our home. We only had the first floor and basement left to do. Of course, as you know, when you are working on a big project something else has to come up, am I right?

The hot water tank began leaking the day before the pex was to be changed out. It needed to be replaced and was completed on the day the pex was changed out. 

New hot water tank complete, new pex complete, all in one day with 5 plumbers in our basement. It was a busy, eventful day. 

We had one leak at the washer which was repaired the following day. Our hot water tank was lukewarm. Umm... I like my showers hot, so it was a struggle to shower under lukewarm water. 

Our home had what I will call hot water on demand, 1950 style. We have two hots and a cold water line running throughout our home. When the hot water tank was changed out, the hot water return which allowed hot water on demand did not work for some reason. The plumbers were unable to figure this part out. 

When the hot water return valve was shut off, we had hot water. We do need to wait about 15 seconds for hot water now, but I am not going to complain about 15 seconds. This may help in lowering our electric bill since the hot water tank will not always be running for the hot water to be right there at the faucet when we turn it on. I will keep an eye on our electric bill to see if this is the case. 

Now, could this have saved us on the pex hot water return line being ran? Yes, but again, at this point, I just want running water in our kitchen. It's the small wins. I may have been upset before, but now? I just want to get back to normal life here. 

I am unsure why the estimator for this work did not quote the drains to be completed as part of the pex, but it wasn't or so I learned that day. We have a vent pipe running from the roof to the basement, lead pipe. The plumber indicated we would need to remove the wall where the lead pipes were to change out the pipes. 

Remember the asbestos?

I explained we did not want to go up as high as he had wanted, we were about 2 inches shy of his mark, but he indicated that he needed it removed.

I called for a second opinion.

Did this person want to disturb the asbestos? 

No. 

He said he could clean up the drains in our basement since a few were capped off on the wall under the kitchen. He also changed out the drain without disturbing the asbestos. Now if only we could hook everything up, but alas, you need to have electric to the garbage disposal and the dishwasher, and in order to do this, you need the sink set, but the countertops are not in place, so we cannot do this. 

Multiple trips is what we are learning... for everything.  

Flooring Setback

If you recall, we were pretty excited to be able to use our pine tongue and groove subfloors. Surprise, surprise, another fail. We found that the luan under our carpet has mastic adhesive. We thought we could refinish the floors ourselves, but now, we will have to cover the luan and move on. 

We are meeting with a flooring company next week. Once I knew I needed to pivot, I had dreams of vintage linoleum. Can I ask you a question? If we are hearing linoleum is making a come back due to it's variety of options, and ecofriendly make up, then why are businesses not carrying it? Total bummer for me. I do love those vintage linoleum floors... 

Why Kitchen Remodels Spiral

So now, do you see all the moving parts? How one project leads to 10 others, and how there are times when you are at a standstill?    

So what is all of this costing and how long is it taking? Keep in mind my husband works long hours through the week, I work on what I can when alone, and we are at the mercy of others. 

Budget breakdown

Cabinets: Oh my goodness, we did not actually begin tracking hours until after this project, but I can say a month. 

I did waste about $70 on paint and primer, then I purchased white stain from Ace Hardware, it was about $24. I had the Old Masters Early American here from refinishing the buffet. It was $34.50 from our local paint store. 

I used my crafting sponge brushes which I already had. Dewalt Orbital Sander was something else we already had. Minwax Natural Wax $18   

Backsplash removal: 2 hours, 0 cost I used a spackle scraper and a hammer, both we already had here

Soffit removal: 3 days, 0 cost, minus this tool that we have used many times over already Oscillating tool $119 ShopVac we already had here

Electrician: Remove existing wires, run new wires to lights, mount lights. He has been here several days, $2430. This work will not finish up until the ceiling and wall repairs have been made. 

Plumbers: galvanized pipes removed and pex installed $3465, I am not including the hot water tank since it wasn't really part of the kitchen remodel

Second Plumber: $700, drain replaced, new drain pipe to the basement floor, and drain clean out under our basement floor

As you can see, we still have a long way to go, so more expenses will occur. 

We are choosing not to do the ceiling, this will be just too much dust for me to handle. The gentleman we met with will texture the existing ceiling where the soffits were. 

I had hoped for a smooth ceiling, but he indicated with my health issues, it would probably be more than I could handle since we would even have dust all the way to the attic. No problem, I can live with texturing.

We have already purchased our countertops, but they cannot be installed until the hole behind where the sink will be has been repaired. We purchased two slabs of granite for $398. Total price for slabs, and installation is $1271, and this includes a Tier III granite. It pays to shop around and visit granite suppliers. 

Our price will increase a little bit if we include an additional cut, we have not figured that part out yet. Oh, we will, but we have to wait until the sink is set. 

I would like to point out a few things, if you read the previous kitchen post in our series, then you know we only received two actual quotes for our kitchen, so I do not have a lot to base my opinions on.

Remember the $60k quote? He quoted over $12k to have pex installed. My actual price is a far cry from his quote. He also quoted $4200 for countertops. Again, our price is significantly less. 

Many contractors mark up materials when they manage purchasing. It is why they prefer to purchase the materials for you. Do you see the mark up here? We saved ourselves nearly $11,000 in just two areas! 

No sweat equity there unless you consider the calls I made to schedule the plumbers, and the trip to the granite store. Even if you do not want to do any work yourself, you could be your own general contractor and save. Grand total to this point: $8131.50. We still need flooring, backsplash, ceiling repaired, and many holes in the walls repaired as well.    

Health Issues During This Remodel

Stress makes my MCAS flare. When my body is under pressure, everything becomes harder — breathing, sleeping, thinking, healing. I’ve had allergic reactions that scared me. I’ve had days where my face swelled, my joints ached, and my lungs felt tight.

I don’t share this for sympathy. I share it because it affects the timeline, the pace, and what I’m physically able to do.

So if you’ve wondered why I haven’t been sharing my usual recipes and upcycling projects, this is why. Real life has been loud and exhausting, and I don’t know how to be anything other than honest with you about it.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is it cheaper to DIY a kitchen renovation?

Yes — but only if you’re prepared for surprises and willing to learn as you go.

How long does a DIY kitchen remodel take?

Longer than you think. Ours has been a journey of months, not weeks.

What was the hardest part?

The unexpected issues behind the walls and the constant mess.

Related Kitchen Chronicles Posts

I’ll continue to share updates as they unfold. You can find our progress by clicking the links.  

How to Refinish a Vintage Buffet

Kitchen Chronicles I: Our DIY Kitchen Adventure 

Kitchen Chronicles II: Behind the DIY Kitchen Remodel (What No One Tells You)

Kitchen Chronicles III: Unexpected Repairs, Cold Weather, and Slow Progress 

Kitchen Chronicles IV: Vintage Lighting 

Kitchen Chronicles V: DIY Paint Stirrer Stick Chevron Cabinet Panels  

Kitchen Chronicles VI: Reworking Our Existing Cabinets for a New Kitchen Layout 

Kitchen Chronicles VII: Choosing Natural Stone Cabinets for an Old Kitchen

Kitchen Chronicles VIII: DIY Stacked Kitchen Cabinets

Kitchen Chronicles IX: How We Built a Hidden Microwave Cabinet

Kitchen Chronicles X: Double D Floors and More Review 

Kitchen Chronicles XI: How to Transform a Hollow Core Door into a Stained Glass Look

Kitchen Chronicles: XII: Restoring Leaded Glass Window Cabinet Door DIY Kitchen

A Little Note Before You Go

Are you ready for Christmas? This kitchen is our Christmas this year — no shopping needed. We had hoped for a functioning kitchen by then, but it’s not looking likely. Maybe next time I’ll be back to puppy dogs and rainbows again.

Thank you for being here. Truly.

Ciao,

Cara