kitchen progress!

since we bought our house in june, we have been working almost every weekend on the kitchen. we've taken on a huge project, considering that we have done all of the kitchen work ourselves [minus the plumbing.] and when i say 'we' i mean my father-in-law and scofield. i am the official 'cleaner...' and i did paint both the cabinets and island! but all that other stuff ... nailing things, knocking down walls, building islands and bookcases ... not my specialty. we are forever indebted to our sweet family, and all they have done to help us turn our house into a home! we can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel in our kitchen and we are so excited. not to mention, i can finally get on a regular eating schedule again ;). so here's just a little taste of the progress we have made ....

^ this is what the kitchen looked like when we bought the house. since then, we've made a doorway into the sunroom where the sink and window use to be, we've added floating shelves, painted the remainder of the cabinets, added new counter tops, subway tiling, built an island, and moved the sink and dishwasher to the island.

^ this window use to look from the kitchen into the sunroom. the only way to enter the sunroom was through the garage, so we turned this window into a door. now the sunroom is super easy access! hooray, because once it's finished, i think the sunroom will be one of my favorite rooms in the house.

scofield has been really good about documenting the remodel along the way. i've had more of a "i never want to remember this terrible stressful time" kind of attitude ... but really, i'm thankful we have the pictures so we can look back and see just how much we did.

we knew we would have to add an island to accommodate the sink and dishwasher if we wanted to build a doorway. we got quotes on islands, and buying a new one would have put us out of our budget. so, what would have cost us $3000, we built ourselves for $500. we also picked out a butcher block countertop for the island, and i am in love!

i'm pretty sure scofield and traverse [my father-in-law] were hammering and nailing away at 1:30 in the morning to get these shelves finished. i was feeling really guilty lying in the bed, not getting any sleep. but at that point of night, and having no idea how to help, i was more in the way than anything. i'll be sure to repay them both with many, many home cooked meals ;)!

 ^ here are our floating shelves now, with all of the tile and a coat of paint!

i love white rooms with pops of color, which is exactly the direction we have gone with our kitchen. when we moved in, it was so dark, so i immediately knew we wanted to brighten it up! we've done that with white countertops, subway tile, and white cabinets. now i can't wait to incorporate bright colors. so far, this pop of blue on the door is one of my favorite details.

we're not done yet, but we're getting there! we have some finishing touches to make, floors to clean, a microwave to install, and i'd like to change the light fixtures. can't wait to share the finished product!