Kitchen Renovation Part One: Planning

The Fisher’s Next Big Adventure: A Kitchen Renovation

Are we crazy to be doing so with 2 children 3 and under?  Maybe but we are beyond excited for the final product. 

We knew very early on moving into our home that our kitchen was not very functional.  Updated? Yes. Adequate?  Absolutely!  But not anywhere close to practical for a family of four.  First off, it’s very small for the size and layout of our home.  I am talking we have 4 accessible upper cabinets, 2 lower cabinets, 6 drawers, a small pantry, and very impractical storage above the washer and dryer.  What they were thinking when they designed and built the house in 2004?  I have no idea!  Another pet peeve?  The laundry is in the kitchen.

Well we have been talking about reno options for a long time and had planned on it being a project we took on in the next 10 years.  In fact, Matt and I agreed that we were going to add on to the garage (3.5 car garage) before we made a change to the kitchen.  We need the extra garage space for the boat, cars, and misc tools and stuff that accumulates.  The garage project was slated for this upcoming summer.  That all changed when Matt said to me about two months ago “You know, I’ve been thinking… We should really do the kitchen first.”  I, internally, was jumping up and down freaking out bubbling with excitement like a 5 year old.  My husband who was going to get his garage addition before our kitchen remodel (which I was absolutely ok with) was willingly giving up that idea so we could do the kitchen first!  It basically boiled down to the fact that as a family the kitchen made more sense to do so we could enjoy it and get use out of the added functionality.  
 

When looking for a contractor we stumbled upon Best Choice Cabinets of Kewaskum.  Our loyal and amazing photographer Jamie Gellings had recently begun doing work for them and mentioned it casually in conversation.  After meeting Mike and learning about the Amish hand crafted cabinets he uses, we stopped our search.  Hands down, they have been absolutely amazing and extremely helpful from the very first meeting.  He came in with Jamie and we came up with some preliminary design ideas including moving the sink to a differently location, adding a prep sink to keep the traditional kitchen triangle, blowing out the current pantry and moving it along with moving the laundry upstairs to our master closet (Yay!  I am soooo excited about the laundry!). 

Here are some before pictures  (please excuse the clutter and messy counters) and preliminary after pictures.  Sorry for the quality of the design pictures.  I took pictures of the pictures :)  

Laundry is currently behind the bi-fold doors and there is an eat-in area by the windows

Fridge will be centered between the pantry shown here and sink moved to window area

Existing pantry is getting removed and stove will be centered on this wall adding more cabinets and counter space

 

This area now includes a prep sink and seating area with storage under the bar of the seating area.

We’ve made some minor changes to these along the way but overall this is pretty close to how the finished product will look. 

The cabinets are going to be in the cream/ivory family with a glaze (the dark edging you can see in the lower picture).

 

Flooring is going to be a 12 x 24” vinyl tile (pictured below the counter sample but hard to see).
I am obsessed with the backsplash which is going to be this morroccan style grey lantern tile.

 

 

Countertops will be quartz Caeasarstone “Piatra Grey.”  This picture (and the one above) doesn’t even come close to capturing how pretty it is with the veins of light grey and cream. 

The sink is going to be a white farm house/apron front.  We aren't sure if we will leave the fluted or smooth edge facing out yet though.  It just arrived yesterday and we were so excited to unpack it!  Got it on ebay for half the price they normally retail for!

Stainless appliances are purchased along with a new washer and dryer.  The wall color and other small touches are still yet to be determined and the project isn’t slated to start until mid-March or April which at this point just can come fast enough!!! 

Any pointers out there from someone who has been through a kitchen reno?  It's going to be very hard living without a functional kitchen for 5+ weeks.  We are trying to plan and come up with contingencies on how we will eat and where we will store everything.  Yikes!!!