The Difference a Day (or two) Makes

For the past month, the kitchen has looked like this. As you know, we put floors in a few weeks ago and life was tremendously better. Sorry it's not a great pic of the kitchen, but check out what a difference the past two days have made! Ta da! It's like a home show, they show you the bad, the redo, the finale all in 30 min without the suffering. We're far from done--as in all the finishing work, but we are so close to really functioning.

Two days ago the countertops arrived which meant they could install our appliances, finish up electrical and put casing around our posts. Did you know so much rode on a countertop?

And speaking of, I tried to get a picture of our new princess sparkly counters (the girls love them), but trust me that they sparkle. You almost don't notice the concrete floors below. Almost. Josh and are I going on a date to the tile store (me for the umpteenth time) to hopefully make a final decision. Ah, aren't they stunning? I never thought white or sparkly for my counters, but I think they'll look awesome with it all together.

The oven even works! I've promised Hazel that we'll make cookies today. Might as well debut with a crowd pleaser. I'll be using Alicia's best choc chip cookie recipe ever, which it truly is and if she doesn't mind, I'll post it.

I started cleaning up our dishes today, you know, like unloading the dishwasher, but had to stop and take a picture to document the last time we'll be doing this! I wish I had a pic of times after we've had people over and had towels all over the ground. BTW, that baby toilet is clean. ish. We're healthy anyway.

I can't tell you how many HOURS it has taken us to decide on all the decisions to make in this little kitchen renovation. This sink, for example, absorbed a many many hours. I was sold on the large one bin sink for a long time, I love it. Then we ran into a little faucet issue with the window behind it and it hitting the faucet, so with an offset sink it lessens that problem.

I think we'll still have to saw the window in half and just use the top part, but it got me thinking about a two bin sink and I think this will be more functional and it's a pretty large sucker, I love it.

Oh, and the faucet itself took hours and hours to find as well (everything took seperate trips to various stores and online). It looks pretty simple, but it did. We wanted a swan neck, pull out sprayer, but with the handle seperate and that's where it was a pain to find. FINALLY DONE!

The only time our microwave will be this clean. One of Josh's clients is Whirlpool so they get an awesome discount on appliances, so we have almost all appliances from there. His job sure has it's downsides, but this is not one of them.

See, it works! I am sort of afraid to break everything in, it all looks so new and shiny. I managed to dump out the oil from my salad dressing into the drain, but that's all I could do to it today. It's perfect. I love the tape that says it's okay to use! See ya bathroom kitchen.

Although I keep heading toward the bathroom to wash the kids and dishes today, habits die hard, but I'll try to break that one. It sounds strange, but I'm such a creature of habit and comfort that I'd almost prefer to not change things in a way because I have a system that works, it takes no thought since I know what I'm doing. Now I have to start moving in sort of (or will once the cabinets come in) and it's a lot of effort, but thankfully it's the kind Josh doesn't mind, so he's encouraging me.

It was this way before we put the floors in too, I was just getting comfortable and finding ways to "live" in our space when we have to move it all around and it's just more effort. Thankfully Josh reminds me how insane this is so hopefully I won't still be using our bathroom to do dishes or using paper plates for every meal (kind of gross with wet foods because when you cut your meat or whatever, it cuts up the paper with it so you get a little extra goodness).

Our stunning new electric oven, hip hip hooray! Also the only time it will be clean.

Our equally stunning cooktop. It's dazzling isn't it? I've always wanted a 5 burner because as ridiculous as it sounds, 4 just isn't enough when I cook since I rarely use an oven (except for desserts of course).

We also got a fridge and dishwasher put in, but pics take too long to download and I'm so excited! They are the kind that are coated or faux stainless so you won't see the drips as much and you can put magnets on the fridge, unlike stainless. That way we'll get to have a nicely cluttered but loved fridge still:).

Q: What's your favorite element?

Q: I know you probably don't really care, but I'm so excited that I have to ask--aren't you thrilled for me? :)