Kitchen/Living Room Renovation

Oh wow, I have a blog. And this isn't a post about unfortunate baby names. My goodness.

Two people asked me today about our kitchen renovation so I thought it would be a good time (a year later!) to post about what we did and what I'd do differently and how we priced it out and made our decisions.

First, a few pictures.

Wood cabinets that M sanded and polyurethaned when we moved in, old appliances, tile countertop (that grossly matched the floor tile).

Other side of the kitchen - we removed the chair rail AND knocked down the wall on the right side of the photo (opening up the living room into the kitchen so the first floor is one big room).

That good old wall:

And the new ktichen...New counters, new cabinets, new appliances, new floor. This was the old paint though - apparently i never took any final photos. And no microwave yet. Or faucet!!

And this is another old picture but it gives a good idea of the new floor throughout the first floor and the knocked down wall. Old paint and old furniture though.

The breakdown:

Countertops - love love love granite. It was pricey but I thought it was worth it. It's so pretty and cleans up so easily. The color is Uba Tuba. I received a snotty comment from a woman who works in our local paint store about how it's "been done" but I don't care - I like Uba Tuba and I think it goes with everything. PS. I left the paint store. One note - we obtained three quotes on granite countertops - the first quote was DOUBLE the other two. So remember to shop around. Also this one included the lovely giant sink.

Cabinets - cabinets are hella expensive, y'all. Did you know that? I did not. Our originals ones are wood and nice but nothing special - I wanted white cabinets so it seemed ridiculous to spend money when we (ahem, Mike) could just paint them. So he did. Ha, that sounds easier than it was. Let's see...he took them down, sanded them and then painted them about a trillion times over with many layers of white and the polyurethane-type stuff. He used Rustoleum Cabinet Transformations. The whole cabinet project probably cost $100-200 total (for the kit, extra brushes, etc...). If you were handy, you could probably do without the kit but we weren't that adventurous. Or you could hire someone to do the painting for you which would be obviously more expensive but less testing on your marriage.

Oh also, we got new doorknobs for the cabinets in oil-rubbed bronze (ORB). I also spray-painted the other random kitchen accessories with an ORB spray paint. Awesome. I love that spray paint.

Appliances - Sears had a big sale on stainless steel Kenmore appliances. We got a new dishwasher (required a plumber to hook up), fridge (also required a plumber because it has a water/ice dispenser), stove (plumber AGAIN for gas hook-up) and microwave (contractor to get it bracketed up over the stove AND an electrician to wire it).

It's bedtime so i'll have to do a part 2 later on (ha, like in November when I update the blog again).

Still to discuss:
- the floor
- knocking down the wall
- paint
- sink, garbage disposal, faucet

I hope that's a good start!