Ready or Not....Here We Go

Its been a long time coming. I knew it when we bought our house that this day might arrive. I secretly hoped it would, and yet I dreaded it too. Our house was built in 1955, you see. And it had the original counters, sink, and cabinets to go with it. They are old...dead old. I've managed for 3 years to live in my kitchen happily. Okay that's a lie. I've pretty much had a hate-hate relationship with it. Yeah, I pretty much hate it. But we asked ourselves: Would it be worth it? Would we get our money back when we sell the house someday? How long will we live here anyways?

About 6 weeks ago we decided it was time to replace the counters and the sink, but that the cabinets weren't too bad (ha!) and that maybe with a splash of new paint and hardware they would look just fine. We even went out to Lowe's and bought some pretty new counters, and a new sink.

Well, it didn't turn out exactly as we had hoped. This is what we found when the counters were removed:

Rotting wood.

Need a closer look? Here ya go, this is the part around the sink.

This was our turning point when we decided the cabinets just weren't worth keeping. Mike's heart sunk when he realized how much this would cost our savings account. And mine leaped for joy at the fact that we basically had no choice in the matter. (I was getting a new kitchen!!).

So fast forward a month. Our Korea trip is over, we finally are at a point where we have time to do this highly anticipated project. (I can say that because I'm not the one doing all the work). And I hope you don't mind that I'm going to keep this blog frequently updated on our Kitchen Project for the next 3 weeks! So stay tuned!

And for enjoyment's sake, here are a few pictures of our kitchen 6 weeks ago:

And here it was this afternoon:

Yes, it has our new counters temporarily placed on top (which is how we've been living ever since the rotten wood discovery). We won't be able to use the counters since they won't fit our new layout. Its a loss, but not a huge one. We are going to see if we can sell them on the classified ads and maybe get some money back out of them.

Tomorrow is demolition day. Mike is ripping all the cabinets, sink and linoleum out. And we'll be left with 4 walls and a subfloor. The appliances will be moved to my living room, and I'll be cleaning Emmett's dirty bibs and dishes in the bathtub. Here we go!