home: kitchen renovation phase 1

Remember when you wanted that purple comforter for your room and you begged your mom and dad for WEEKS to get that colorful, plush bedding in your big girl room? Think of me doing the same thing but way older, wanting a renovated room for FOUR YEARS and begging my husband to just let me do it! Well, that's been the scene around here since we moved into this gem in 2010.
We just love our house - crown molding, two fireplaces (with mantels to -scape), enough rooms, great entertaining flow. It just rocks. But that kitchen.

And last week, we took the first messy step - pulling it all out! Warning: beg a very expert family member or friend to help you during this phase. If this was just me and J, we'd still be trying to pull out that first cabinet.

Four hours later, we pulled out the cabinets and walls, loaded my brother's truck and cleaned the space. My brother took two upper cabinets to add to my parents' garage and I posted the remainder on Craigslist for free. We made one trip to dump the junk.
Now, we have an electrician upgrading the electrical in the kitchen and house. We needed some work in the house to bring it up to code and while we had this clean slate, it was the perfect time to get that done. He's been moving right along and if all goes well with the inspection, we should be able to move on to Phase 2 next week - walls!

Once we finish the project, I will share the timeline and costs as it was incredibly hard for me to find this information while researching for this project. I think we have something good to share!
And just take a look at what I hope it all looks like when I'm we're done.
(thanks to Going Home to Roost for sharing freebie arrow art for these fun graphic projects!)