When I left my job at AGC in 2012, I talked about changing my Corian countertops to granite. However, we took the money set aside for the granite and bought a Generic whole house generator. That was a good decision.

In the years that followed, I’ve had a Pinterest Board where I’ve pinned new kitchen ideas and while I continued to think about how I’d like to update my kitchen, I have become more satisfied with my kitchen. When I was younger, I was such a consumer–discarding things simply because I wanted something different. I’m much less that way today. I have a very functional kitchen, and I am grateful for it. Many would love to have this kitchen.

Prior to the pandemic, we talked about selling our home and property in Mendota and moving elsewhere. We spoke with a realtor, arrived at a price, and then for whatever reason, we stalled. Once we were told to “stay at home,” we both realized we liked our home, we liked living in the country, and we liked living near my sister and brother in law. We wanted this pretty view and quiet place to continue to be our home for hopefully another five years or so.

We opted to make a few investments in the property we were now going to keep beginning with things like guttering and heat pumps. Then, we realized we needed to do a few things to our guest house which is an airbnb — mainly swapping out lighting, adding some shiplap, putting new flooring down in the laundry room and removing carpet from the steps to keep it fresh and as a desired place to stay. (Funny…as we did this, we also blocked off dates because we really didn’t want guests to stay during the pandemic so we were getting it ready for no one!)

About 2 weeks ago, the guest house was finished. I thought we were through, but Mike then asked me what I’d like to do to my kitchen since we now planned to stay. My kitchen is now 21 years old — old enough to drink! My Kraftmaid semi-custom cabinetry is looking dated and the lower cabinets near the sink are showing some wear and tear. I told him that I would not want to tackle the kitchen unless he was totally onboard. I knew I could be happy with my existing kitchen; it worked fine, and if it wasn’t something he was invested in, then I’d rather forego the stress of even a small kitchen redo. He wanted to go ahead but we had to be mindful of the budget for this project. New cabinets were not in the budget.

I do not want simply a repaint or reface. While I do want to paint a portion of the cabinetry, I also want to modify my existing cabinets, yet about half of them will be exactly as they are today with the natural cherry finish.

Here’s the modifications I want: