Grand Plans

Every so often I dream about what I will do to my house once I have enough money. Ah, the grand plans I have! I don't want my house to look like a showroom, but we've been here for almost seven years now and it's not really reflecting us. It's also in great need of "updating" and "upgrading" to several areas.

Our house is a split-level ranch (or at least that's how it's been explained to us). The kitchen and the bathrooms are the two rooms I'm antsy to get moving on. They're stuck in the '80s when the house was built. The kitchen would have been fine if the owner before us had not painted the cabinets white. I could seriously pull my hair out trying to keep my cupboards clean. White shows everything! Also, I've noticed that I will never ever ever get cabinets that have any recessed panels. Cleaning in those stupid crevices makes me nuts and that's where every grubby, sticky food/liquid ends up.

Ok, so here's what I want to do my house:

Kitchen:

• replace all the cabinets
• tear out the soffit (is that what it's called?) and have the upper cabinets to to the ceiling for more storage
• get a new countertop. I'd love granite, but anything is better than the crappy formica we have
• get an undermount sink; but it has to be a double basin
• get a flat surface stove. We have electric, so I would just rather not deal with the gunk that ends up in/under the burners. My dream would be to have gas, but we're not "wired" for it
• have the microwave wall mounted over the stove with a great hood. Ours is crappy; barely helps when I'm cooking up a storm.
• Ideally have 6 burners, but I'll settle for a new stove
• I'd love wall-mounted double ovens, but I have a feeling it'll compete with my next "want"
• a full pantry. Floor to ceiling and about four feet wide. I'd be in heaven. I already know where it will go...on the side of the kitchen that currently has no cabinets. We put a free standing "pantry" there, but I want one that's built in. It would go from the light switch to the corner
• cabinets under my half wall...we have a half wall that divides the kitchen from the dining area. Right now, I have an island that I can pull out with a drop down leaf I put up when doing some heavy duty baking. I want this to be my baking area with storage below. Where this countertop meets the pantry, I want an appliance garage to store my Kitchen-Aide mixer and have a corner cupboard/help to display some cute tchakis (did I even spell that right?)
• new fridge with a pull out freezer on the bottom half and double doors.
• all appliances the same color (currently I have an almond colored fridge--original to the house--, a white stove--curtosey of my mother-in-law who decided we needed one while Robin was painting the kitchen and I was in Canada--and a black dishwasher--we replaced the original one when it broke and I decided I wanted to go all black with the appliances and started with the dishwasher...sigh).
• recessed lighting around the kitchen
• under cabinet lighting
• new flooring (we should be getting that this summer--YES!)

Bathroom:

• new tile in the bath area. This is really more of a need than a want. What we have there is awful and moldy. I have to keep on it constantly or it's gross
• new soaker tub. A deep tub to just soak away the stresses of the day
• a cupboard to store my towels. I have no where really for them now. I just need to figure out a way to incorporate this in so it doesn't look stupid. We have no floor space to install one floor to celing as the bathroom is quite narrow
• new sink and cabinets. Nothing really wrong with ours right now, I just want to update it.
• recessed lighting all around the room; pull out the craptastic lighting we now have
• new flooring...not sure yet what I want, but I'm thinking maybe cork. I despise tiles so I don't see myself going that route. With the room being fairly small, I think we could swing cork and not have it get insanely expensive

Downstairs:

• replace the 80's carpet with laminate (hopefully by next summer)
• build in storage in our dead space at the bottom of the stairs that currently houses our computer armoire
• we have a half shelf type thing that runs the perimeter of our downstairs rooms. I want to build in some shelving/cupboards and get a flat screen/hdtv to put on their thus freeing up floor space
• plantation shutters for the windows...my homemade curtains suck :S

So much for the grand plans...I have to have the moolah to do all this with. Hopefully over the next 2-3 years we can get these things done and paid for. The thought of incurring anymore debt makes me want to be ill so for now, they're just grand plans...