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We’re lucky to have a great photographer in Meghan Thomas, who assists us in capturing moments from our events. We’ve posted some of Meghan’s photos from our December open house, which included the ribbon cutting for the renovated Day Program kitchen.

This entire project started with a basic need–better tools for food preparation for the participants of the Kirkpatrick Day Program–and grew to a multi-day renovation. The December event was the icing on the cake.

Take a look back in time with us at the progression of the project:

• Kitchen Renovation Update
• The Calm Before the Storm
• Thursday Morning Renovation Update
• Thursday Afternoon Update
• Friday Morning Update
• Friday Midday Update
• Late Friday Update
• Saturday Update
• Before and After…
• Renno Wrapup
• Cutting the ribbon (with video)

In 1988, we moved into our building here at 441 West Kirkpatrick Street. A gift from Donald Moore, the building provided a home for both our Alzheimer’s day program and the chapter’s support services. More than 20 years later, the Chapter is running strong. The day program welcomes between 20-25 people each day, while the office staff has grown to meet the needs of the community.

We outlined the renovation of the day program’s kitchen this past August. Last evening marked its official unveiling. An invitation-only party welcomed day program families past and present, and local supporters to see the fruits of our labor. Pictured above (from left) are Chapter CEO Cathy James, Chapter Board President Larry Malfitano and Connie Foote, from The Carriage House Foundation. The trio cut the ribbon and officially opened the kitchen.

If you weren’t there, we invite you to watch Cathy’s remarks and the ribbon cutting on YouTube!

An art piece submitted by participants at the Kirkpatrick Day Program earned a blue ribbon at the New York State Fair. “Hands of Hope,” a mixed media piece, won first place in the Senior Citizens art competition. Specifically, the piece topped the Senior Group Competition.

The piece remains on display through the duration of The Fair in the Arts & Home Center.

Pictured with the piece are four of its five creators: (from left) Ara Saxenian, Leon Claeys Sr., Carolyn Casey, and Dolores McIlvain. Lorraine Pollock, who also worked on the piece, is not pictured.

The day program staff is cleaning, sanitizing and moving furniture as we write this post. So we’ll do some last-minute cleaning up of our reports on the renovation.

Our staff worked with the kitchen and bath department at Home Depot Store 1257 in Camillus, which contracted Stairs Home Improvement to complete the renovation. All told, the crew installed a new sink, faucet and garbage disposal (the dishwashers were fairly new and came over from the previous kitchen), 19.5 feet of laminate countertops,  nine wall-hung, six floor cabinets and a 24×84-inch pantry, a 33-inch Maytag refrigerator/freezer, 30-inch Maytag convection range and Maytag microwave and the natural gas line to power the stove and oven. They also demolished and removed the previous cabinetry, counters and appliances. The only thing we are waiting on is a new coffee brewer, which will be connected directly to the kitchen’s plumbing.

The ceilings in the kitchen, dining room and hallways were installed by Duger Enterprise. This job included nine new troffer light fixtures and a new drop ceiling.

An online photo album below has pictures from each step of the renovation.

Kitchen Renovation

The construction crews wrapped up just past 8:30 p.m. on Saturday. Members of our staff took a few hours on Sunday to restock the kitchen.

Here’s the before…

And, here is the after:

The ceiling is done! There is now drop ceiling through the kitchen and dining areas, lobby and corridors leading away from the lobby.

New lighting fixtures have been installed, tripling the amount of lighting power in each area.

As for the kitchen, the construction crews worked until 7 p.m. Friday. They broke for lunch a few minutes ago with the wall cabinets hung and about 70 percent of the base cabinets installed.

On tap for the day is the installation of the sink, faucet and garbage disposal, new appliances (refrigerator and range; the microwave and exhaust fan are in), pantry cabinet (pictured at the very bottom), the remaining base cabinets and countertop. The crew is confident that everything will be finished today, leaving Monday for cleaning and sanitizing.

The appliances have just been delivered and unpacked, and our old appliances carted away. Currently, the new Maytag microwave, fridge and range are in the sitting room awaiting installation.

The cabinets are about 25 percent installed. Looks like a full day ahead of the crew tomorrow.

The first crew arrives Saturday at 7:45 a.m. Check for an update tomorrow around lunchtime.

The Craftmaid Cabinets truck is out front of our West Kirkpatrick Street location as we speak and the new cabinets are being unloaded. It looks like we’ll have appliances delivered within the next couple of hours. Could we *gasp* be ahead of schedule?

Things are coming together in the day program. The ceiling in the hallway and lobby will be done by early evening. Here’s a look:

In the kitchen, demolition is complete and everything has been cleaned out. New GFCI breakers have been installed and tile has been installed in the exposed area between the counters and cabinets.

The crews will be hanging ceiling rails this morning in the lobby and adjacent corridors. However, the early morning noise is all about the kitchen demolition. A second team is ripping cabinetry and countertops out to make way for tomorrow’s installation.

You can also view a video clip (allow a few seconds for the video to load, depending on your Internet connection) of this morning’s cabinet demo!

Below top: The wall cabinets are down! Below bottom:The dishwashers are disconnected. The dishwahsers are relatively new and are the only pieces to be salvaged.