Kitchen Reno - We've Been Framed!

So we've been living with a gutted kitchen for a while and it's kinda sucky, but there's a few things that have to be done before we can really go nuts with drywall and flooring and all that.  One of the big things is framing.

For most folks, gutting a room means taking it "down to studs" and that's pretty much true for us also.  However, our house isn't all stud construction.  The exterior walls are concrete block and brick with skinny furring strips and when we removed the walls (plaster & backer board) we found that the furring strips were in rough shape.  The wood on the wall by the back door was pretty much rotted out and/or eaten by termites.  Also the furring strips are only 1/2" thick which left pretty much no room for any kind of insulation.  Wouldn't it be nice to have some insulation?  Yeah, it would.  And so we took down all the existing furring strips.
  

Before putting up any drywall (or doing any wiring on the exterior walls) Jason essentially had to "reframe" them all.  In order to avoid losing any width to the kitchen, Jason built sections of the wall with ripped down 2x4s so that the walls are 1.75" deep = the width of half a 2x4.  This will give us enough room for a bit of rigid foam insulation as well as some room for wires (outlets & under cabinet lighting).

This process seemed to be pretty slow, but taking the time to ensure this wall is plumb, level, straight and perfect will hopefully make the cabinet installation a smooth process.   After putting up the wall, Jason used shims and masonry nails to secure it to the wall.  A regular 2x4 wall won't have the same sort of wiggliness that these cut-down pieces of wood have, but now that it's done nothing is moving.  The wall looks straight, feels solid and will be a good base for cabinets once we're ready.

Anyway, it's DONE!  One more item on our to-do list has been ticked off and we're one tiny step closer to having our kitchen back.

Here it is all ready for wiring & drywall!

So excited that things are moving forward!