Pulled The Rug Right Out From Under Me!

This is the rug that was in the dining room, it now has a new home in the kitchen.  The rug size is 7'10 x 9'10" and is a dark charcoal almost black colored rug with beige, ivory, khaki and brown tones in the pattern. Found it at BJ's a while back for $99, pretty good price for the size.  It was moved around every room on the first floor, until I found the perfect spot for it, the kitchen.

 It matches better with the things I have going on in the kitchen.  My palette in the kitchen is black, burlap,  ivory and pops of red. The other rug on the left was too small, it was only a 5 x 7 and didn't cover the floor properly.  And why is it that we love these hardwood floors but we cover them up all the time?  Hmmm......... There is a question to ponder.

Kitchen Update

I am giving my whole kitchen a fresh coat of paint, including the ceiling, along with some new home decor.  It's been about 6 years since it's been done, too long, so I hired my favorite neighborhood painters to help me out with such a large project, they are both great workers and have reasonable prices.  The kitchen needed brightening up, so I chose a happy color to go with my cabinets.  The cabinets are a cream color with a hazelnut glaze, and the granite counter tops are a mix of light and dark. The cabinets were not easy to match a color to, my kitchen currently is on the dark side and I want it lighter.  I researched some paint companies and their colors, as well as going to home improvement stores and grabbing paint strips.  It has taken me about a month to finally decide on my color - Benjamin Moore Good Vibrations for the walls, Sherwin Williams Antique White for the trim and Benjamin Moore Ceiling White for the ceiling.  Here are the before and after pictures, they did a wonderful job, Thanks Guys!

Before the big job, this is where the coffee bar was behind the island, everything off the walls.......

and patched.  My goodness there was a lot of patching!  I must be careful hanging new things.

Ceiling painted and first coat on the the red wall....

and the laundry room wall....

 The breakfast area and cooking area before the first coat....

 patched and covered.

First coat on....

 more of the breakfast area.

First coat on the remaining wall of the breakfast area and over the kitchen sink.  Stay tuned I will be redecorating in the coming weeks.  The trim work still has to be painted, so I will not be hanging anything until painting is complete and all cleaned.

Walls are completely done, YAY!  Stay tuned I will be redecorating in the coming weeks.  The trim work still has to be painted, so I will not be hanging anything until painting is complete and all cleaned.

The Kitchen Kupboards

Some of the nicer features that we added to our kitchen, when we built our home, are useful and great for storage.  When we decided to build again (this is the second house we built), I researched through every outlet available, to add as much as I could to the kitchen. It had to be useful, I didn't need things that would just take up space, look pretty and not be able to have a purpose.  I cook just about everyday of the week, churning out breakfast, lunch, dinner and desserts.  It is my favorite place in the whole house and I still could improve upon it, but you know that costs money, and with two kids in college that won't happen.  Hopefully the features in this house will stay updated for a long time. We put a lot of thought into choosing everything while it was under construction, so when the time does come to move on, hopefully it will need very little.  All the appliances are GE Monogram and I love them all!

This is the Cook Top with a Warming Drawer right below it

The Warming Drawer under the Cook Top - I have used this many times during parties to keep food piping hot until guests arrived and for many big Sunday morning breakfasts until the kids got out of bed and were ready to eat.

There are 2 medium pans with lids and 1 long large pan with a lid.  Also a rack on the opposite side for warming. Sometimes I also use it for storage.

Bottom of Double Oven drawer. All cookie sheets and baking racks fit nicely in the drawer.

Baking Station Cabinet - Drawers hold all of my baking extras.

The drawer on top of the cabinet holds all baking and cooking utensils.

 The top drawer of the cabinet holds all bowls, measuring cups, ricers etc. 

And the bottom holds all kinds of baking and muffin pans.

This drawer holds all steak knives and sharpeners.  Then.....

 The cutting board slides out on top of the drawer to cut bread or chop vegetables.

There are two spice racks that slide out on both sides of the cook top.

The prep sink on the counter and the fake panel.....

Pulls down with a hidden storage container for the sink stopper, sponges, scrubbies and of course Band-aids because I am always cutting myself!

Home on the Range

In case you are wondering where all the recipes on this blog evolved from, here is the place.  My beloved kitchen.  It's my favorite place to be.  I sit in here half of the day thinking of recipes, working recipes and trying them out on my family. When we built our home almost 8 years ago I paid close attention to how I wanted my kitchen to work for me.  I worked with the builder and the kitchen contractor and designed what I wanted. After moving walls and resetting appliances I hope the next family who lives in this house will love it as much as we do.

All appliances - dishwasher, 6 burner (propane) cooktop, warming drawer, double Trivection oven , and refrigerator are GE Monogram.  The range hood is a Kenmore.

This is my baking station.  I had the builder install a cabinet just for the KitchenAid mixer.  We all love the mixer, but it's big, heavy, and takes up alot of room on the counter.  The mixer sits on a spring loaded shelf. You lift it out of the cabinet and it self locks into place.  When you are done using it, unlock it and it slips right back into the cabinet.  The cabinet also came with a bottom pull out shelf for storage. Right next to this cabinet is a drawer where I keep all of my baking utensils. Under that drawer is a double cabinet, with pull out shelves, where I keep all of my baking pans and bowls.  Everything is organized and in one place.  I had a sink installed on one end of the 11 ft counter for cleanup.  On the other end are bookshelves for cookbook storage.

A closeup of the cabinet.  I also had baskets installed for towel storage, I use a lot of towels!

So this is where it all happens. I hope you liked the photos.