I happened upon a blog titled Hooked on Houses and jumped at the chance to show off my house (again) for their fall edition of house tours. Everyone loves to look at others houses right? Now you can do it from the comfort of your own home! If you click on the tag, you will be taken to Hooked on Houses Tours - fall edition, where you can click on the others who are participating and see how others live.
As most of you are aware, husband and I bought a new house not too long ago, April of last year to be exact. Since then we have done some major, and not so major renovations. I'm still waiting on my custom built bookshelves for the library, which we haven't ordered yet because of cost. haha! Otherwise I would show off the library because that's my favorite room in the house. Instead, I'm showing off the kitchen. This is the room that took the most work and is the biggest renovation we did to the house. (And.....stay tuned because we are going to be re-doing the master bath this winter...so I'll have pictures of that at some point)
I'm going to start off by showing you the before pictures. Otherwise you just aren't going to be as impressed with what we did! As some background info, the house is 20 years old and at the time we bought it, the house had not been updated at all. Apparently, the original owners loved pink. Husband and I? not so much.
So this is the kitchen. yeah. Need I say more? Lots of pink. Plus, what is going on with that island? It's so small...too small for the room. Plus we didn't like how the stove was in front of the fridge, no way you could get access to the fridge if somebody was cooking at the stove. Where the hanging (pink) light is, is where a table was supposed to go.
This is another view of the kitchen. I'm basically showing you this picture because we did make some changes to that wall. Keep looking...you'll see.
This shows the sun room, at least that's what we assume it was. See the pink blinds. Yeah. We didn't see a need for the sun room, didn't think it would ever be used. Sure, it could be a nice place to sit and read..all those windows. Except...we were (and did!) planning to convert the living room into a library with a place to read.
OK...now here are the after pictures! Major difference don't you think? (psstt..pay no mind to the spakling on the wall - I forgot it was there when I took the picture). As you can see we made the island twice as big and we moved the stove so it was near the sink instead of the fridge. We made sure there was enough room that somebody can be cooking and somebody else could be at the sink (and there's even enough room to load/unload the dishwasher!). Don't you just love the crown molding on top of the cabinets? It really made a difference. The countertop is granite, Labrador green. I had wanted the black one with sparkles in it, alas that didn't happen because it's way to expensive, but we are happy with what we got. We also added a spot for the microwave to be off of the counter. Notice it? Love it there.
Remember the picture of the walls? Here's the renovated picture! We closed off the original door to the family room and put a bar there. We then took out part of the wall to make a big opening to the kitchen. Now when you are in the family room, you can easily see in the kitchen and spy on the cook...and the cook can watch tv or spy on you. I wanted it so when we have a kid we can easily keep an eye on the baby/kid, I think husband wanted it so he could see the tv.
Lastly, remember the sun room we didn't think we would use? It's now part of the kitchen. Tada! We took down that partial wall, replaced the blindes and the light. Now the kitchen is perfect for family gatherings! At the last gathering I was able to put a card table in the space between the island and table and we could all eat comfortably in the same room. (ok..I know..the chair is missing from the table. My husband likes to watch tv when eating...and there is an opening into the family room there...so he can watch tv. But..if you put a chair on the end of the table it's in his way. alas...the chair is stuck in the corner)
So that's it! I hope you enjoyed the house tour! Thanks for stopping by.
9 comments:
Oh my gosh, what an amazing difference! Your kitchen looks fantastic! (I love Hooked on Houses, too.)
Bermudaonion - Thanks! We love it and are so happy with the way it turned out.
It's so beautiful!! Love the redo!
Fantastic remodel! Love the new floors :)
rue
What a wonderful transformation of the two rooms! It really doesn't look like the same house. How long did this reno take? Did you have a contractor do the work or are the two of you handy?
The end result is just fantastic.
:-) Sue
WOW!!! That's some remodeling! It's beautiful. I look forward to seeing the master bath and library. :)
Kelli - Thank you! I can't wait till all the appliances stop work and we replace them with stainless steal. haha! I think it will look even better then! Of course..the husband isn't looking forward to that since the double wall ovens and in-counter stoves are extremely expensive.
Rue - Thanks! We love cherry colored wood and it was either do the cabinets in cherry or the floor - we opted for the floor since it's also what we used in the dining room and library.
Sue - Thanks! We hired somebody to help with some of the work (such is tearing down the wall to the family room - there was a wet bar on the family room side and so the water pipes had to be cut and shut off, etc) We also had somebody help us put in the cabinets and my Uncle helped with the under cabinet lighting and the crown molding. Other than that..we did it on our own! (oh...except the granite install...the company we bought it from did that). We don't consider ourselves very handy, built our first house so we wouldn't have to do anything. But...we definitely learned with this one. We didn't have the money to redo the kitchen the way wanted and pay somebody to do it all, so we did as much as we could. It took us a couple of months. We started in April and I think we had it back in working condition either the end of May or early June. We both work full-time outside the home, so we only had nights and weekends to work on it. Then we took our time completely finishing it. We didn't do the backsplash until March of this year and we did the cabinet hardware (handles) a couple of months ago. I actually still need to paint the trim. haha! We did the hall bathroom spring of this year and I still have to paint the trim in their too. Man..maybe I'll do it today...or maybe not. haha!
Thoughts of Joy - Thanks! We are planning to hire somebody to do the master bathroom. lol! There are just too many things we want to change that requires somebody who actually knows what they are doing, which isn't us. The library....I love it but most of my books are still in boxes. We have 9 ft ceilings and I want the bookshelves to take up one wall from the floor to the ceiling...so I can't buy ones already made. grrrr. I know what I want...it's just a matter of finding somebody to do them that we can afford. We had an electrician do some work for us and one of his friends is a furniture maker, he took measurements and a picture of what I want to his friend and the quote was around $2000. So...just need to get finished with the master bath, save up the money, and then do it. I can't wait!
WOW! You did an amazing transformation to that kitchen. Love it! Thanks for sharing with us.
Sam - Thanks! It always feels good to know others like what we did. :)
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