our house, part 5: the kitchen

Okay. I don't even really know where to start with the kitchen. I could start by showing you the hideous before pictures, or by telling you that I will never, EVER IN MY ENTIRE LIFE, remodel a kitchen EVER AGAIN. EVER. Am I making myself clear enough? N-E-VER.

The kitchen was entirely re-built. Entirely. From scratch. Every single thing in the room is new, from the walls to the ceiling to the flooring to the cabinets to the countertops to the appliances. EVERY LITTLE DETAIL was agonized over by me (because, you know, for me the kitchen is where the magic happens, and I wanted it to be perfect). And everything that could go wrong, did. Even the smallest thing became a major issue. And to top it all off? I was pregnant. Yes, here I am, demolishing a kitchen and probably inhaling pure asbestos through my Michael Jackson mask, totally and completely, unbeknownst to me, PREGNANT, and also, sporting a farmer's tan and stupidly forgetting to tie my hair back:

We started working on the kitchen in September of 2007. We didn't finish the kitchen until April of 2008. For those of you playing along at home who remember that Andrew was born in May, this means I went through almost my ENTIRE pregnancy with no kitchen. NO. KITCHEN. TO SPEAK OF. Therefore, fulfilling my pregnancy cravings was...challenging.

It took forever to do everything. Forever. And once we found out that I was pregnant, there were a lot of things I couldn't help with -- for instance, holding up 100-pound pieces of drywall for Joe to nail to the wall. I got the okay from my doctor to help with painting, but Joe refused to let me. He did the entire kitchen -- aside from installing the cabinets and countertops -- all. by. himself. We had people to help us with the demolishing, but Joe put it all back together himself. See, look how badass he is:

But I'm getting ahead of myself! Let me first show you what the kitchen looked like when we moved in:

The faux brick finish! The Dollar Store stick-on green marble cabinet coverings! And yes, that's right, you do see carpet. CARPET! With that hideous, disgusting linoleum underneath. And look how stained the carpet was:

I know, ICK. Sorry -- that picture probably should have included a disclaimer.

Clearly, we had a lot of work ahead of us. We started by tearing out everything, and luckily we had people to help us, like my dad,

and my stepmom,

and my mother- and brother-in-law and a few of Joe's friends.

My stepmom and I spent a lot of time outside on the back porch, loading detritus into a cart to be hauled away, looking for all the world like pre-pubescent Coneheads:

Here's what the kitchen looked like, mid-demolishment:

And here's what my pride and joy looks like now, from the same angle:

My beautiful kitchen, the third love of my life:

It's my dream kitchen. All of the hard work, all of the months spent eating fast food -- totally worth it.