Bye Bye Gold Stove

Last October, my husband and I were talking about selling our home.  We were looking at some homes with acreage... with room for bigger animals (like horses) and more room to roam for our family.  But before we could put it on the market, we went from room to room, making a quick project list of some things we should probably change or finish up.  One of the things that stuck out to us like a sore thumb was our old 70's harvest gold stove.  We thought we'd sell faster if the stove was replaced.  So we moseyed our way down to that big orange box home improvement store, on a mission to find an updated stove.  Since we were "just replacing it to sell" we didn't want to go "all out".  A nice flat top white stove would suffice.

We found our stove and hoped for a quick in and out, replacing one stove for another.

That didn't happen as seamlessly as we had hoped.  The gold stove didn't go all the way to the back of the wall.  So we would have to cut the back part of the old counter top to make the new stove fit.  We knew we couldn't sell our home with a countertop that had been cut.  (That would look terrible!). So back to the big box, orange home improvement store to look for an inexpensive, quick countertop option.  We found a great faux granite version that would "appeal to most buyers".  But THEN we realized that this in stock countertop would require us to put in a new window.  (Remember that book "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie"?  Yup.  This story kind of unfolds like that.  One thing kept leading to another.)  Our current window was huge and went all the way down to the existing countertop. There was no backsplash.  The new countertops came with a backsplash...

So we shopped for a new window that was slightly smaller and would allow for a backsplash.  My husband installed it and then had to patch in some new sheetrock underneath it for the backsplash to but up against.

New sheetrock meant new texture too, blending the old sheetrock with the new. Such a mess!  But the small finishing touches make all the difference in the end.

I gave the old cupboards a fresh coat of white paint and then had to repaint the walls too (Dolphin Fin by Behr) after they had been textured.

Here is the final product of all those little changes.  I decided to remove all of the doors on the top cabinets for a more open look.  It's a small kitchen and I felt like removing some of the doors made the space feel an itty bitty bit bigger.

We also ended up replacing the light fixture above the window and left the blinds off the window.  It lets in so much natural light and we love it.  Also, because our home is a split level and our kitchen window is on the second story (and we don't have any backyard neighbor's) we still had enough privacy to keep this window blind-less.

And then guess what?  My husband and I kept thinking and praying about the houses we were looking at buying and ended up feeling like we were supposed to stay where we were for the time being.    I was really happy with the kitchen updates.  Our kitchen was now far better than it used to be.  But I'll shamelessly admit I cried.  We spent all this money installing new kitchen products that would update the space enough to be able to sell our house quick.  However, I didn't pick out the stove or the kind of countertops or new cabinets I was in LOVE with.  I don't mean to sound ungrateful, but for a few days I was kind of sad about the whole process.  Luckily, I got over it.  My husband agreed to install some pretty white subway tile in here this summer to make it more "me" and I had to put this all into the right perspective.  A kitchen is just a place to prepare food for my family.  A place to teach my kiddos how to cook and clean up a meal, a place to linger with friends and laugh and share stories. All of those things still happen whether your stove is gold, stainless, or somewhere in between.  In the grand scheme of things, it's just a place, a thing.  I'm grateful for this space and I'm grateful I get to keep making memories here with my family.