This faucet has done it’s time. We simply couldn’t get it clean. Trust Me. John tried. I tried. We used a sponge, steel wool, Comet & a few other cleaning products, too. We just couldn’t get it to shine.

Hard water is just hard on things. There’s no way around it. From my lovely locks of hair, to this faucet, hard water makes everything a little dull.

So, I purchased a swan-neck faucet at Lowe’s for $88 to replace the old one. If you think that price sounds sort of high – join the club. I actually went with the mid-grade faucet. The highest one I saw was just over $200!

The hardest part of installing a new kitchen faucet is…getting the old one off. I thought I could do this own my own. I gave it a shot, but it was pretty pathetic. This is how John found me when he came in from checking the cows at about 8:30 p.m. Pretty brave, huh?

Actually, it was a fail. It was super stuck. I didn’t move those screws even a half a centimeter. Oh well. He muscled it off & I helped by handing him tools. We started and finished this project during the NCAA Championship game. I seriously wonder what we will be doing next year during that game. I hope we are eating rotel and cheering for Mizzou (or SDSU) from the couch and not working under our kitchen sink.

If you decided to put in a new faucet. Here’s my version of the 10 Steps. Don’t worry, new faucets also come with pretty good directions & pictures.

10 Steps to Install a Kitchen Faucet

1. Shut off water. Really important. Don’t forget. Or else you will be soaked & the project will end poorly at step one.

2. Let water flow out of pipes. We flushed the toliet, turned on the tub, the bathroom sink & kitchen sink. It took less than five minutes for the pipes to empty out.

3. De-attach water hook-ups.

4. Take off old faucet by turning the plastic screws. You might need some really big wrenches. Some that weight as much as a few pounds. No joke. The ones we used were heavy-duty.

5. Remove from sink by unscrewing the plastic thing-ys. Not sure what they are called. We found a little corrosion.

6. Ewwwwwwweeeeeee. Cringe. Weap. Toughen up. Start Cleaning. Wear some gloves.

7. After 30 minutes of elbow grease & scraping the hard water deposits off with a knife – this was the best I could do. I had to be semi-careful around the rusted parts because they are a bit weak.

8.  All ready for the new one. It was down hill from here! We simply set the faucet into the holes & then repeated the process with the sprayer. Then, John tightened the plastic washer/screw things.

9. Re-attach your water hook-ups under the sink.

10. Turn the water back on. Be sure you shut off the tub & sink in the bathroom, or else you’ll have a flood and MORE home improvement projects on the list instead of less. Bad deal.

Ain’t she a beauty? I put the faucet to use right away. Did I mention 100-year-old homes don’t have dishwashers? They have people who wash dishes. When this house was built, they didn’t even have water inside the home. Those pioneer women had to pump water from the well, haul it in the house, start a fire, heat it over the fire, THEN start to wash the dishes. I’ve got it really easy.

I just love the simplicity & functionality of Correlle dishes. Anyone else? I think these look extra clean on account of having a new, clean faucet to wash them with.

Between the new faucet & a new backsplash, a person would have no idea the are in 100+ year old home! Yipee. However, we did maintain the “authenticity” by keeping the farmhouse-style sink. We tried anyway. That was my goal.

Even though I was a bit surprised about the price initially – after one load of dishes – I decided it was worth the price. This was quite the upgrade for about a tank of gas. Well, one, If you drive a big truck. Two, if you drive a car. Anyway, I am super-duper pleased. Thanks to this project we have a sprayer now & higher clearance under the faucet. I love the higher clearance, because I am higher than the average dishwashin’ gal. I am tall. Now, I can stand up totally straight and wash the dishes, instead of hunching ever so slightly forward with the old one. Someday, I might ask a carpenter to build me a custom house for tall people. All cabinets & countertops will be designed around my 5′ 9ish’ frame. What a lovely dream. For now, this faucet is pretty wonderful. Best $88 bucks we ever spent.

Thanks, thanks, thanks for reading! Sierra Shea