where to begin?

It all started when the Man agreed to go ahead and make a few changes to our nest. He suggested we call in Uncle Contractor to see if our wishes could be realized. On a sunny afternoon a few months back, Uncle Contractor dropped by to hear what we had in mind. As we told our tale, he took a look around and responded with many exclamations of "what a mess, what a mess."

My hopes were that this was not a foreboding notice of what was to come nor a commentary on my sometimes lackluster cleaning rituals.

(Please keep in mind that I try to keep a tidy nest, sometimes almost to the point of bugging the Man, but we are two busy nerds.. so occasionally I have to let a little of the dusting/vacuuming/mopping/general cleanliness slide.)

Instead, Uncle Contractor was just expressing his concern over if we could even tear out a wall, or cut a really big hole in it. He was worried about the whole "supporting wall" thing. After he crawled around in the attic for a while and said "we'll see what happens, but I think it'll be fine." We decided to trust his expert advice and give it a try. Everything has evolved from there. So let's take a quick tour of where it all began:

The view of our kitchen from the living room-- who doesn't love a shiny brass chandelier?

The view of the living room from our kitchen-- or the kitchen wall we plan to demo. I'll be keeping all the lower cabinets, but for the upper set I have an idea. Another shot from the same angle, but you can see the edge of the doorway we plan to open up a bit more. This also highlights our lovely laminate counter tops (which we'll be keeping, for now) and laminate covered MDF cabinets. These cabinets will warrant a post or thirteen on their own, but let's just bask in the glory of whoever thought this was a good idea for a long-term lasting kitchen solution. I could hit them over the head. Again we see an appearance from our friend shiny contractor-grade brass and MDF. Ah, lovelies.. just wait for what I have in store for you!

While we're looking at the "before shots" I'll share a quick picture of our entryway:

You may not be able to see in this picture, but a recent 5 minute project for me was to frost the mini-window.

The Man also installed our brushed-nickel lever door handle on the front door on the first day in our new home, November 30th, 2009. It's one of my favorite improvements to our house so far-- partially because I'm a sentimental sap.

So there you have it.. the beginnings of our remodel. Now just to finish it!