{inspired} lovely kitchens

Happy Friday friends! Thank you all for your sweet comments about my little blog redesign. :) I find myself heading over to my site a couple times a day just to admire it.

Today I thought I'd give you a peek into what spaces are inspiring our kitchen remodel. In my head resides a dream kitchen. And it's beautiful and perfect, obviously. In reality though, I have a husband and he also has opinions. Luckily, our opinions aren't that far off from each others, which is making planning fun. We've been spending lots of time on Pinterest and the other internets looking at gorgeous kitchens. Below are ones that have caught our eyes.

 forever lovely design

This is my dream kitchen. White cabinets. Dark/black counter top. Island. Butcher block counter on the island. Subway tile. Farm sink.

house and home

 house of turquoise

jh interior design via design sponge

In reality though, we're still discussing somethings. For instance, whether we want white tiles. I'm waffling. Maybe I want something with a little color? I'm loving tiles that incorporate a little grey marbling. Gorgeous.

traditional kitchen design by providence interior designer Kate Jackson Design

houzz

We're also still debating counter color. Do we want black? Or maybe a grey to soften things up.

modern kitchen design by furniture and accessories IKEA

houzz

Or, even more crazy. Maybe we want dark butcher block throughout the kitchen, instead of just on the island.

lillie dale

Or, the craziest: Chris is campaigning for copper counters. I just don't know. They're beautiful, but I'm not sure if they're *us.* In other words, if they're *me* :).

centsational girl

Aside from counters, we're considering ways to add either beadboard or moulding to the kitchen walls or ceiling. Maybe to wrap the island?

decor 8

My goal is to save the original hardwoods that are under about three layers of linoleum. After all, we know they're beautiful. But, we worried about staining from the heavy linoleum glue. So, I'm considering adding a little paint to liven things up. 

So that's what we're working with right now. As you can see, we want a kitchen that's light, bright and open. But, we're trying to find ways to keep it warm and welcoming at the same time. We don't want to accidentally head into the cold and sterile realm.

What do you think of our inspiration? Any ideas you'd like to share? What are the key elements in YOUR dream kitchen? :)

Have a great weekend friends! 

{renovate} my blog!

So, you guys may have noticed, but I have a new blog layout! Thank you to all of you who've already complimented the layout! I actually learned it was live when a I got a blog comment about it :). Some of you saw it before me! So, if you're reading this post in reader, rss or your email, pop over to the site so you too can see it :).

I worked with Elizabeth at TMC Designs (aka The Mustard Ceiling), and she was wonderful. She worked with all my weird and completely ocd requests and I just love the finished product.

There's just a couple things I want to point out:

1. New header! I LOVE the new look. You all know I'm a HUGE orange fan and I love how Elizabeth incorporated it here.
2. The toolbar that was previously at the top is now on the side. All the same buttons are there: our house before and after photos, the diy project gallery and as seen on. There is one addition: recipes! I have quite a few delicious gluten-free recipes on the site and now there's a place for you all to easily access them.
3. I think the thing I'm most excited about are my new social media buttons! Seriously, I'm been so envious of other sites that have them. You can find me on twitter, pinterest, instagram and google+.
4. You can follow my blog here. I'm still using blogger friend connect because I'm still one blogger. I've given this alot of thought, but decided not to change for now. We'll see if I regret that in the future :).
5. Or, you can sign up to have posts emailed to you. Someone asked me a few weeks ago how to get email posts, and here it is. 

The rest of the sidebar stayed the same. Oh, and I realize there are two pics of me ... we're changing that :).

Hope you guys enjoy! Don't you think Elizabeth did an AMAZING job?! 

{renovate} the KITCHEN!

Friends, we made an exciting purchase this weekend:

Yep, a wall mount microwave and oven! OMG. We've been teetering on the edge of starting a kitchen remodel and with this purchase, we're going for it. YAH! :) The best part is that we found it on Craigslist for less than $400. And it is IMMACULATE. Seriously. From a immaculate home, looks like it's never been used, just a few years old. The previous owners just wanted to upgrade to stainless. We'll go ahead and take advantage of that. 

Some of you might be wondering about that actually ... our decision to stick with white a appliances if we're remodeling. There's a couple reasons. The first is that our existing appliances, and most importantly our fridge, is white. Buying all new appliances is out of our budget, but it's also not something we want to do, which leads to the second reason. While I think that stainless is beautiful, I've never really thought it fit the character and age of our home. It's strictly a personal decision. I've seen tons of older homes that pull it off beautifully. But when we originally bought the fridge a few years ago, we put a lot of thought into stainless verses white. I've never regretted the white. This decision actually came in very handy when we decided to look for a used oven. Most of the appliances listed on Craigslist are there because people are upgrading to stainless. So, if you're looking for white or black, there are some incredibly new and inexpensive appliances for sale out there.

We're still in the beginnings of our planning and budgeting phases. So, I'll be back with tons more information about our inspiration, our choices, time frame, goals and budget. I was just busting at the seams to share this with you though :).

One decision that we have made, that I will give you a good idea about the scope of this project, is that we're tearing down the wall between the living room and the kitchen! Yep, that wall above! Will be gone! (I think the post ranks #1 in my entire history for exclamation point use. Can you tell I'm excited? :) Hence the wall mount oven :). I've been trying to figure out a way to open up the space since I moved in. But, that wall has a lot of storage, so to get the storage back, we'll be installing an island. Big changes, my friends, big changes.

Have any of you gone through a kitchen remodel? How long were you without a sink or an oven? I'm a little frightened :). Any big changes in your home this spring??