The answer is: 6 hours

What is the time it takes to put in a new dream kitchen sink! Seriously, since about a month into moving into this house 5 years ago, I have wished I had put in the sink I wanted instead of the default generic sink. And finally this year I did something about it (ok, Erin helped a lot, and friend Jay who works at Home Depot helped us pick out the right stuff and get a good deal).

We ordered all the parts nearly 2 weeks ago, and they came on Wednesday - a black granite deeper sink basin (8.3" vs. 6"), an oil rubbed bronze tall-neck faucet with in-faucet pull-out sprayer, and oil rubbed bronze side drinking water tap. Additionally, I have always wanted an under-counter water filter (in place of the Pur one attached to the faucet which is awkward and gets in the way a lot). So, at about noon, we were kind of wandering around the house and decided let's just get it done, and started around 12:30.

First was to remove the old sink - actually easier than we thought. Turn the shutoff valves, disconnect the supply lines, and disconnect the PVC drain lines, and remove the under-counter clamps holding the sink in place. After we pulled off the old sink, we cleaned up the old putty that was sealing it in place from before (not too hard).

I have to say I'm glad things are so standardized these days - everything is standard sizes. The sink itself was the exact same size as the old one, we had to notch out two corners just a bit because this sink has square corners and the old one had rounded ones, but 2 minutes with a saw took care of that. All the new supply connector lines were the same size, and the drain holes are all the same size. We had to buy one new piece of PVC and cut it a different length, but that was really easy (Erin is a pro!) Even the sink basin itself is easy to set up - the 3 standard holes are cut but it has knock-out holes for anything else you need.

At 2:30 we made a quick trip to Home Depot to pick up some caulk, plumbers putty, and teflon thread tape. Back home to finish - Erin put caulk around the edges of the sink and we dropped it into place. We put in the under-counter clamps, puttied in the drain holes, and hooked up the drain and the garbage disposal. It was at this point we realized that we'd need the different length PVC pipe (originally it looked like we wouldn't need to change anything), and while Erin was doing that I discovered the adapter for the water filter was going to be the wrong size, so we made a second trip to Home Depot at 4:30.

Said hi to Jay while we were there, and he helped me figure out what I needed for the water filter adapter while Erin got the PVC we needed. We also bought a jigsaw as the one I had was so old it fell apart the first time we attempted to use it earlier.

Back home to REALLY finish this time! Cut the PVC, finish the drains, mount the under-counter water filter, put in the adapter, and re-hook up the supply lines. Turn on everything...doh! Something was leaking. Checked all the connections, the cold water supply line wasn't quite tight. Take 2. All looked good! Ran the water for a minute as recommended before hooking up the sprayer, and then ran the drinking water for 5 minutes so the excess carbon drained out of the filter. Turned the dishwasher on...all was good.

Or so I thought...I'm always paranoid when I do plumbing work, and this time I'm glad I was, because the drinking water connection was leaking. Badly. Fortunately we caught it before it got out of hand, cleaned it all up, and checked the connections, and I think it wasn't tight enough. Continuing to monitor.

The cats were loving this whole day, because of all the chaos and new things to explore, so this was a treat for them too. Boxes everywhere, stuff strewn all over the kitchen...they were in heaven. We had to shoo them away from under the sink while we were working, but they were pretty good, and it was fun to watch them play in the boxes :)

The complete picture-by-picture account:

New Sink