At last. After what? Six months? Nine?

At last, I think I can call the kitchen finished. Or at least close enough to finished that I will not spend every waking moment thinking about painting, flooring or cabinet hardware. Before we see the finished project, let’s take a walk down memory lane, shall we?

The day we moved into the house…

Most hideous kitchen, but most cutest model.

And it just gets better and better…

Remember – the guy who owned our house before us was blind. Not that I needed to tell you that…you probably could’ve figured it out by that last pic. no?

So we took down the wallpaper, which made a difference. And we took down the cabinet that everyone hit their head on and that made a HUGE difference.

We changed out the light fixture and then my birthday gifts arrived.

And then the great floor debacle ran its course, but we ended up with lovely floors just the same.

And finally…I bit the bullet, picked some colors and painted up the cupboards, the walls, some family rules art and a chalkboard spice cupboard to use as our shopping list spot. And finally we have this…

I can’t even tell you the difference in the lighting situation in the kitchen. It has SO MUCH LIGHT. It is awesome. I did include that last pic there so you can see the new back door – which helps a lot in the lighting situation!

The colors are not perfect in the photos, but here is the rundown on what is what.

Wall: Benjamin Moore Manchester Tan
Upper Cabs: Benjamin Moore Bleeker Beige
Lower Cabs: Benjamin Moore Alexandria Beige

(All three are just different shades from the same swatch family. If BMs site wasn’t being so difficult I’d try to put the paint colors up there…but, well, it is being difficult. So you can go check them out if you are interested.

The cabinet hardware we got from Lowe’s. It is the same oil-rubbed bronze as the light fixture and it brings out the brown in the grout (I hardly notice the old tile…in fact, I think I kinda like it now!) and the floor tile. And the paint colors have just enough gray in them that they look great next to the stainless steel appliances.

I think at some point we might want a little more color – but I have artwork and window treatments to find still and I figured I can pull in the blue from the tile into these. We also need to find a microwave/vent for over the range to get rid of that old hood. And I’d love to get a new faucet at some point, too.

But like I said…it is close enough to finished for me. And I’m sure for you all, too. So, NO MORE KITCHEN posts! Well…at least for a few months, ok?

“For being a ‘STAY-at-home Mom’ – you are never, ever home!”

That is the greeting I got from my sister when I picked up the phone yesterday. I can’t really argue with her. Our start to summer has been just one big, long stream of to-dos. I think we are finally slowing down this…just in time to jet off to Chicago & Michigan for a vacation in a few days.

Before I go, I promise to update pics & vids of all of our recitals and excitement over the past 2-3 weeks. All of this activity has left very little time for any Crafting…but we have been trying very hard to get our house ready for summer. So while it isn’t so much crafty, there has been some decorating – or at least decisions – happening. Including some…wait for it…decisions and activity on the KITCHEN. Yes, indeed. My indecision has finally stepped (cautiously) aside and we have movement, people!

But first…I finally found a great outdoor rug for our patio. I found it when (and where) I wasn’t even looking for one. I’ve been eyeing one at Target that has been hanging out around $119-$129 price range, so I had planned on waiting for that clearance tag. Then I was walking out of Bed Bath & Beyond a few weeks ago, I happened upon this one that I like even better, on clearance for $75! And of course with that 20% coupon that is always floating around – we scored for $60 a nice new outdoor rug.

I like that it is neutral enough that when we paint and I change my cushions the rug will fit right in.

Before a little June Birthdays party we had last week, J. also hung some cool outdoor party lights for me. I have a few more strands to zig-zag over the patio…

I like them so much, I think they are going to stay up. They are going to be perfect for dinner and drinks on the patio all summer long.

NOW…on to the kitchen. Are you guys all sick of hearing about this kitchen yet? I’m 100% certain poor J. is. And I think he is completely exasperated with me, too.

When our kitchen saga began I was certain that I wanted white appliances. J. wanted stainless steel. I was not convinced. After months of shopping for appliances I said to J, “You know I kind of like the stainless steel look. I think it might work.” J. just rolled his eyes at me. (And we got stainless steel appliances.)

When we started looking at flooring, J. pipes up with “I like the wood floor look.” Oh. No. I was insistent that we could never do that – we have real hard wood floors throughout the entire house, we can’t match it and it would just look weird. No. Absolutely not.

Um. Yeah. About a month ago I *found* this great porcelain tile that…looks like wood planks. It is definitely different than our hard wood, and is dark and looks like the wood beams we have running through the living and dining room. Guess what we are doing on the kitchen floor? (Ignore crap phone photo! Soon I’ll have real photos!!)

The poor man. But, he has been dealing with me and my whims for over 20+ years now. I think he has probably learned, just give me a few minutes (weeks, months…), I’ll come around to most things. I just need to work it all out in my little brain.

Anyhow – the flooring is tile…and so cool. And yes, we are going to have it laid out in a herringbone pattern like that. It will have definite differentiation and will be kinda awesome, I think.

Meanwhile, to refresh your memory. Our kitchen yesterday morning -

Our kitchen around noon-ish -

(Hi Robert & Henry! Thank you, thank you, thank you for wrestling with the 40+ year old glue and vinyl. Man…it did not look fun.)

And our kitchen last night after they left -

It already looks better! And will you please note that I DID (mostly to make up for my stubbornness!) finally hang some shades in the breakfast nook for J. It was a compromise of sorts – I was not going to put those horrible shutters back up, J. was not going to let me not do anything…so in the meantime I found simple roman shades at Lowe’s. I might have to va-voom them up with some trim or fabric once we get colors sorted out.

And now – it is imperative that we paint the cabinets. I mean, it was before, but in a few days we are going to have dark wood floors, so I think it will speed up the need for paint when I see all that wood in there.

I had my design posse come over for lunch a few weeks ago and we all came up with these two colors:

Except I’m going to match it to Benjamin Moore colors…we had a Behr color deck to use, but I’ve really fallen in love with BM paint. It is exceptional and I get $5 off coupons from them regularly.

We are thinking the lighter parchment color (which is just a shade darker & a little creamier/browner than our trim color) for all of the upper cabinets and the gobi color for the lower cabinets. That way we don’t have a whole lot of white/cream with all of the cabinets + the tile countertop going on. But it will be a nice progression with the lighter color on top blending with the tile and drawing your eye down to the floor -and the dark colors on bottom for a nice grounding. I’m so excited – and just a wee bit relieved – ok, a lot relieved! I’m ready to paint…now!

But I fear it will have to wait til Robert finishes the floor, which will be just in time to leave for our vacation, which means…by the end of summer it might be kinda finished?