Sylvia's Scenario

I love "Before and After" blog posts.  Everything looks even more fantastic when you put a "before" photo up to show that something has been improved like I did for the kitchen  here  and the deck  here .  Last year was a major remodeling year.  It took us four years of living in this house before we figured out how we wanted to change things based on the traffic flow of people who visit.  For example, people rarely went down into the backyard, they always stayed on the deck.  We learned the spots in our house that were the most popular like our bar area that really isn't even that large.  Areas next to windows of the view were always popular.  Interestingly, the kitchen in this house is not a hangout area, although it is a very functional kitchen.  People just tend to gravitate to the windows to see the view which isn't surprising.  By the time we found a remodeler, we knew exactly what we needed to do - enlarge the deck and m...

I am finally getting my before and after shots of the kitchen remodel.  Our remodel was not completed until December 5th and then we got very busy with the holidays.  In January, I wanted to finish the details like window coverings, rugs, wall hangings, etc. to give it that finished look.  This month got busy with visitors but NOW I am ready.  Above is the "before".  Below is "after". Here are more...  Before After Before After You can see how my goal was to brighten up the kitchen and change out the dark wood and granite for a  lighter and more uplifting effect.  We left the cabinets and painted the uppers an off-white (Benjamin Moore called Elephant Tusk) and painted the lowers a navy blue.  We left the same flooring and replaced the old oven with a new wall oven and a new stovetop.   There was a counter where the wall oven is but we don't miss it all.  We now have more space where...