New Kitchen

When Terry was here visiting me recently she encouraged me to go ahead show some more pictures of my new kitchen. Though I consider it still “not done” (I am working on a backsplash, curtains and built-in seating) here it is as it currently stands.

If you are new to Magnolia Lane, you can read more about our new home HERE. We built this home in the shortest time frame ever–(I think it was about 3 months from foundation to move-in, our builder was amazing)–so I was very limited in how I was able to customize my kitchen and had to make decisions very quickly. For comparison purposes, this is a picture I snapped of a home in our neighborhood with the standard floorplan and features. Its beautiful, but we don’t get a lot of natural light in our home so I wanted as much white in the kitchen as I could get, and if you know us, that is pretty much my taste anyway.

As you can tell, this kitchen has more elements of the traditional “builder” kitchen. In our home, I totally reconfigured our appliances and passed on getting double ovens for two reasons: 1) I really don’t “bake” very much, and 2) we just couldn’t give up the counter/storage space. By using the credit in $ from the cost of two ovens, I was able to get a MUCH nicer range. After much thought and research, I chose a Kenmore Elite 36″ range and I absolutely love it. I did consider –very seriously– a Viking as well as some other premium commercial ranges but after reading about repair issues, costs and wait times I decided to go with a more mainstream brand. It cooks like a dream, I highly recommend it and the bonus was a slightly lower price-tag then a commercial line range.

Much to my husband’s dismay I had the microwave built-in to our lower counter. This is apparently a horrible idea to anyone of the male species (he takes polls, and they all seem to agree), but I very much wanted it out of the line of sight (I wanted the clean line of cabinets looking into the kitchen from the family room). My husband has, by now, adjusted to it being lower then he would like, and it’s also a convection microwave to pitch in on the rare occasions when I actually need 2 ovens.

I have already showed off my new built-in shelves HERE. And, as I mentioned I still need curtains on the large window and I am working on that. The ones I want are back-ordered at Ballard until April, so I may be DIY’ing some curtains here shortly as its very cold over by the window at this time of year.

We also added the desk area at the end of the counter for homework and organizational space, having had a desk in the kitchen in my last home we knew we couldn’t live without it here.

Finally, here is a post on the pros and cons of marble countertops which shares what I have now learned the hard way. We were lucky to able to upgrade from granite to Carrara marble with very little upcharge. I can say I absolutely LOVE how the counters look, and there isn’t anything else out there that is even similar in appearance. However, I will say they do have the tendency to as far as get scratched and water-stained.

Having these counters is a bit like having fine furniture in your kitchen, I am fussy enough to deal with them but it is challenging and I am not sure would not get them again in my next home. (But don’t hold me to that!)

I will hopefully finish up the kitchen soon and be back with a final “reveal”. We are still deciding on the backsplash, I am leaning toward a marble subway tile. With the range hood we selected we have some challenges as to where to “stop” it, do we go to the ceiling? I am pinning backsplashes these days and there are some beautiful ones out there (follow me on Pinterest HERE). Its a tough call! Thoughts?

We do love this space. Terry’s new healthy cooking series is starting up in the next few days (don’t miss that). I am looking forward to cooking all her fabulous recipes right here!