We begin our Kitchen Remodel

I will not be doing as much cooking for the next four weeks since my kitchen will be undergoing renovation. I will still post some recipes here and there but I asked on facebook if people would like to see what we are doing with the kitchen and there were several positive responces. So I hope you will bear with me as I share our progress on our mostly DIY kitchen redo.

Let me know what you think. I do realize what we do may not interest everyone but I hope this will be somewhat entertaining and/or educational in place of the recipes. The kitchens we use do have a huge impact on the food we make and how much we enjoy making it. I know I have readers here from around the world and I would love to hear about your cooking spaces too!

Okay, back to the kitchen renovation.  I am still not sure how it happened but we have decided to completely re-do our kitchen.  The seeds of this began when I cooked my first meal in our new home, 20 years ago and realized I had a very small oven. The usable oven space is only about 18 inches!! I could not fit several of the pans I owned in the oven and on holidays, had to cook two smaller turkeys (one the day before) just to have enough for our guests.

My husband has several friends at work who have remodeled their kitchens lately and one family purchased an oven he really thought highly of and wanted to buy for me. But that would mean tearing out cabinets and counters to put it in…which led to the idea of new cabinets, and new counters…which led to the idea of refinishing our wood floor with a darker stain. In addition, our old, cheap cooktop was almost ready to die so we would need a new cooktop… on and on.

  I had already been looking at new paint and lights. When we moved in, we had to quickly choose light fixtures and paint. We were trying to save money so we went with the cheapest options. The builder would include white or off white paint without extra cost so we stayed with off white. The light fixtures were the least expensive but I never really liked them. We thought we would repaint and replace the lights in a few years, but with young children to provide for and vacations to take; we never got around to it. I have to say, decorating has never been my passion or gift even though I adore seeing well decorated spaces! I just have trouble choosing for my own home so it has always been a matter of sort of falling into a style and collecting mismatched bits to throw together. To be honest, I have never wanted to spend money on decorating.  But somehow, here we are, buying new everything for our kitchen. I have been frugal for 30 plus years so a little spending now is not unwarranted but I do still feel twinges about it.

The other factor in our remodel is that in 15 years or so, we probably will want to sell our house.  The last house we lived in had an atrocious kitchen. We kept saying we would remodel it when we had extra money but then we had to sell it suddenly and remodeled it just in time to move out. We never want to do that again! Putting in a nice kitchen which will still look good in a dozen years is a good investment.  Our kitchen is very dated, not that it really matters to me but getting nice counters, better appliances and updating cabinets that our worn will be helpful. The shelves inside really need replacing and several doors would need refinishing. The lighting actually gets comments such as,” So have you thought about getting new lights?” yes they are that ugly. We have had three floods in our 20 years here- two from plumbing pipes and one from a natural flood which ended up pouring water through my breakfast nook ceiling  and we  have never fully repaired or repainted…oh long over-due.

Last but not least, I think my husband wanted to keep me busy so I would not start on my other spring project. I was hoping to have him build me a chicken coop so I could get some hens. He is not opposed to it but worries that the foxes will eat my chickens and I will be sad. Well, that is what he says anyway J Who wouldn’t want a backyard of chickens? A few months ago some friends did have a chicken massacre in their backyard so the fox thing is a real issue.  But I suppose we are safe for another year because we will be busy working on our kitchen and painting the whole house. And if we paint we ought to put in new carpet in the rest of the house and new window treatments. Yes, no time or energy or money for chickens…this year.

Okay so we need some before photos.  Tonight we start demo!!

Our Kitchen, basically the same as when we put it in 20 years ago with lots of oak that has reddened with age.

The table and chairs in the breakfast nook stay. They are recently purchased from Ikea and they inspired the color on our new cabinets, which will be oyster.

Basically I had a hard time choosing so I made everything various shades of cream and beige with white appliances and oak wood since these were cheapest choice at the time.

I still like the counter, but admit it is boring. The cooktop however has seen better days!

Chickens? What are chickens doing here?