Living where nights remain relatively balmy during fall and winter we find we entertain a lot once our entire neighborhood is back in residence during “the season”. One thing I have really grown to miss since selling our home in Bend and living in the RV and the park model is not having a dishwasher. I don’t view washing dishes several times daily as an evil household chore, but I do particularly miss having one after having dinner companions or throwing a party which means a pile of dishes, pots, and pans which take me hours to clean up, wash and dry. I’ve wistfully told Marc that I wished I had a dishwasher enough times now that he finally got the message and is determined to figure a way I can.
For those not in the know, everything done in RVs and park models is done in miniature scale as compared to normal household fixtures. Appliances are narrower, furniture is small scale, cupboards lack adequate household depth; even water heaters are normally only five gallons! We were smart enough to upgrade ours however, so this park model sports a 20 gallon model so we eliminated one immediate concern. However, there just is nothing to be done about a cabinet whose depth is only 20.5 inches when a normal dishwasher needs at least 25.5 inches.
Looking at our quasi-bar configuration, that cabinet sits in the only and rightful area for placement of a dishwasher so Marc is determined that he can probably unbolt it and take it apart and take it into a cabinet shop where they can carefully cut it to expand it. This is a little too convoluted to explain in these pages but the gist of the thing is that it will then require a new countertop in the entire kitchen. Currently there is wood-wrapped Formica in the kitchen and on the separate built-in buffet. Our thinking is that we will put in new tops done in tile which can then also be run up as backsplash, which I have also desperately needed behind the stove. It will also be necessary to run tile down the end piece which currently houses our heater (and an open hole which we’ve never been able to fix) which has to be removed due to the dishwasher! We’ve not gotten far enough long to figure out where the heater can be reinstalled. It could be near to impossible to try and match the factory wood and stain so tile seems like a better option for this end cap. The look should be a great improvement and I will get my dishwasher!
Unfortunately, gaining a dishwasher forces me to lose my only large cabinet for pots, pans and bake ware so it has been a mad scramble of rearranging and eliminating in order to find room (mainly in the buffet) for these items.
The changes haven’t only been about me and my wants—I agonized for several months over something a little over the top to get for Marc’s present for our upcoming anniversary. We normally don’t exchange gifts at any point during the year and haven’t done anything in years to celebrate our day. Marc hasn’t had it easy giving up his toys this year and since he has developed a passion for baking bread, smoking meats, and just cooking in general I thought about what I might be able to contribute to the kitchen to make it more workable for him—OK, us.
Is this over the top enough? Ah-ha—it hasn’t arrived as yet, so stay tuned next week to find out his surprise!
