Seasidegal's Scrimpy Retirement Diary!

Sun_Addict

Always good to hear from you, glad you’re ok and enjoying life apart from the worktop 🙂

beanielou

Happy shiny new kitchen 

Seasidegal58

Thanks @Sun_Addict - yeah the worktop is really annoying.  I mean the guy who measured up for it was here about two hours fiddling with his app and camera and I haven't got a big kitchen so there's no excuse there!  The two fitters were here less than an hour though. Tbh honest after they had fitted it I was concentrating on looking at the actual top - it had to come in two pieces and I was staring at the join which was actually fine. As they left one did remark that I'd need to have the back of the worktop siliconed which I was aware of but after they left and when I looked it definitively wasn't right. My kitchen fitter agreed with me and said all the quartz fitters he had worked with always did their own siliconing. Accordingly I complained to the Howdens guy as my contract is with Howdens and so has my kitchen fitter who knows him well. We have sent photos to Howdens so watch this space - it's not as though quartz worktops are cheap!😡

dawnybabes

Welcome back ! 

Def get it resolved as it will bug you forever 😂

in_need_of_direction

Happy to hear you and the bear family are enjoying life. Agree with the others about the worktop 

EssexHebridean

Definitely agree that the worktop needs sorting - sounds a little like they measured up thinking there was going to be an upstand? Regardless as you say it's not exactly cheap is it so they need to come and put it right.  Aside from that though it does all sound lovely. I'm rather looking forward to my new kitchen although it will be quite sad to leave the current one on the basis that we designed it from scratch. 

doingitanyway

All sounding good. The kitchen will be lovely once issues sorted

angela110660

Great that you are back and hope the kitchen issue is soon resolved.

milann

Mmmmm funny you should mention Howdens worktop fitters. That’s the only bit of our kitchen we moaned about. They were just awkward…..trying to find fault with everything the builder did. The builder ended up coming around and they had words. We ended up with spare bits Howdens had sold us which apparently should have been fitted underneath. We didn’t get far when we complained either…..They actually look fine but why did we have spare reinforcement bits 😳😳😳

Seasidegal58

Thank you everyone!😀
@EssexHebridean - the guy measuring for the worktop certainly spent enough time on it and my kitchen fitter was there at the time discussing it with him as he had to be here to take out the hob, oven and sink whilst said measurer was doing his bit. So I would have thought he had enough information to pass on to the fitters.  But who knows!🤷‍♀️
@milann - from what you have said it seems the problems seem to stem from when you have a specific quartz worktop fitted with Howdens - I know the job of measuring and cutting the tops are done by an outside firm but not sure if the actual fitters are employed by said quartz firm or Howdens. The fitters certainly arrived in a Howdens van!  Another point being that at the weekend when I stayed with my friend she had just had a Howdens kitchen fitted. She was very pleased with it but said she didn't go with her initial choice of quartz top with them as they quoted her £9,000!  She does have more worktop space than me but still.....🫣

Anyway it's been gorgeous weather here today in Seasideville. 🌞. My friend called to see if I wanted to go for a coffee this afternoon so we just popped over to a nice cafe near me. It's run by a charity who help young people with learning difficulties to get into the job market. They carry out taking orders, serving, till and kitchen work there and quite a few have gone on to a 'real' job outside. The coffee and cakes in there are super too!  I had really lovely cheese on toast - the cheddar cheese was delicious!  The manageress said they buy it from Lidl. Unfortunately there's not a Lidl near me. ☹️

I bought an extra hidden cutlery drawer with my Howdens order as I haven't had a proper 'junk/odds and ends' drawer since I had the kitchen completely renovated several years ago. I've replaced my old cutlery 'inset' with the new one which has left a nice big shallow drawer for the junk. I bought some really nice adjustable stainless steel drawer dividers from Amazon which arrived the other day so will be able to keep all my odds and ends nicely back in the kitchen where the odds and ends belong. Simples! 😁

SCRIMPY MSE THINGS
Actually things haven't been that scrimpy lately what with the kitchen expense but at least the funds were already to hand. 

Anyhow, today my friend and I split the bill at the cafe - nothing else spent. 

On the credit side I won a lucky dip on the lottery as two numbers came up - as it was a rollover I received an extra fiver too!😁💷