One of the first projects I shared when i started this blog a little over a year ago was our dining room remodel and hardwood floor installation. It’s not a room we use that often but definitely one we have been proud of.
Our big project goal for this year was tackling our kitchen. It’s the one room in the house we haven’t touched and the room that needs the most work. After several years of saying it’s time to do the kitchen, by this past December, we were pretty much to a point where we were ready to get serious about getting this project planned out.
Originally we planned on starting the demo right after the Holiday Season but decided this may not be the best project to do in the dead of winter since we wanted to updated windows, replace siding and insulation, etc.. Being without a kitchen is hard enough but if we waited till it warmed up we could cook on the grill and eat outside during the construction and not have to eat out for every meal. Sounds like a win, win!
So we rocked out the closet project and did some other smaller projects this winter (here and here) and recently started working out a timeline for the kitchen and working on cost estimates to see if we have saved enough money to do it all at once. We are very strict about not doing large projects on the house that we can’t pay cash for. No going into debt to do home improvements.
Then just a few weekends ago, B and I sat down to have some lunch while working on some of the smaller projects. We flipped on the TV and Fixer Upper was on. We watched whatever episode it was and the the next thing I know B had disappeared. When I realized he was gone too long to be in the bathroom, I went looking for him and found him in the kitchen with his hands on his hips staring into the laundry room.
I could tell by the look on his face he was thinking something major and when he realized I was there, he looked at me with a silly grin and said he really thought we should flip flop the kitchen and dining room. This wasn’t a totally new idea but something we haven’t discussed in quite some time. We have discussed it at length several times because our current kitchen is so far removed from the main living area and the galley kitchen isn’t really favorable to entertaining. Ultimately, we felt it wasn’t worth the extra effort or cost but I guess B decided otherwise.
For the first time though, B had some new ideas for tapping into the current laundry/pantry room and creating a mud room. While these new plans would make the current kitchen / future new dining room smaller, we rarely use our formal dining room anyway.
We sat on the idea talking about it over and over again and the next morning I got out my trusty tape measure and began working up as-built plans of the current layout.
Once that was done, I began reworking the floor plan to accommodate B’s new ideas and while we aren’t gaining a much larger kitchen by flip flopping, we are gaining a more fitting space for our lifestyle and entertaining.
With some time to sit with the new plans, I also came up with the idea of removing the windows in the new dining room and replacing them with a patio door since it would open right up onto our deck right near our grill and at the spot I had already wanted to create a seating area right outside the back shop door.
I’ve included some very rough plans of the existing layout and how we plan to modify things with the new layout to give you a visual. I cannot wait to begin sharing the actual design and how the process is going!
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