Making a House a Home: Part VI - Design Kumbaya

Every single kitchen remodel I've lived through was filled with surprises and delays, cost overruns and missed deadlines. Not this one. As a matter of fact, if not for a holiday and subsequent inspectors' vacation schedules Joe would have had the project wrapped up a week early! Even the New England January weather pretty much cooperated. Amazing.

Countertops in, appliances going in, floor in progress!

The last couple of weeks were full of banging, drilling, more banging and great progress. On day 16 (!) when the cabinets went in, everything began to take shape. But five days later when the counters were placed, I had the kind of response I'd had when the windows were installed...all I wanted to do was stand there, admire them and run my hands across them!

After that a cavalcade of events took place. Floors stained and sealed, appliances tucked into place, walls painted (another of my jobs), nails driven into heating pipes...OOF, that was a small disaster, but quite literally the only one on this job.

I cannot express how much sleep I lost over some of the choices I made. I also cannot express the relief I felt when it all fell into place. I'd made this sketch to see if I'd like the furniture placement. There were some minor changes but overall I was pretty spot on...except for my wonky perspective.

There's plenty of space to move around the table which extends to seat 8 comfortably (or 10 "intimately"). You can see how great the beam turned out...I did dust it a bit with some vacuum debris to tone down the shine. Worked just fine until nature takes over.

There are still a few more things to do, like have the rest of the hardwood floors stained and refinished to match these. I'm not sure I love what I've put on the wall behind the island, and I miss not having a bulletin board. All very small things.

Before I treat you to the "after" photos I want to circle back to where I began, having a vision of what my kitchen could be and finding someone who breathed life into it. Thank you Joe Cracco of Modern Yankee Builders for making it all possible.

Some Housekeeping

My house has recently been featured in a blog post by a local realtor, Grey Almeida, where you can see more photos of my kitchen as well as some of the other rooms in my home.

Please feel free to visit my Pinterest page to see some of my selections. I have received a bazillion requests for the red that I used. It is a discontinued Martha Stewart color that I had matched at Lowe's. I can provide you with the color mixing code if you're interested. And if you have any questions about any of the other finishes or fixtures, please do write me a note!

After Photos