Thought I would share a fun little personal post.. and I’m so excited about this transformation.

I have been wanting to change out our counter tops since right after we built the house.

What started as a simple upgrade for counters, quickly turned into a whole renovation.

Not kidding.

Literally.. a month of work.

To explain myself… THIS IS How it unfolded….

1. “I am finally going to change out our counter tops!”
2. “If I’m getting new counters, I might as well change out the sink and faucet I don’t care for.”
3. “Hmm.. our backsplash doesn’t match anymore. That needs to be redone.”
4. “I thought I could handle the black cabinets but nope.. they just don’t work anymore with the countertops.”
5. “If I’m going to have the cabinets painted, we should add this feature to it to make them less contemporary and more with the style we’re going for.”
6. “Now it’s TOO much white. We need hardware to break it up.”
7. “Might as well change out the barstools and pendent lights to freshen it up and make it flow better!”

B thinks I’m insane.. true to form, I decided to tackle ALL the jobs at once. Literally. Bathrooms, laundry/mudroom renovation/add-on, and a few other little things.

Some of these were last minute.. as in.. decided last minute to repaint the cabinets and then painters started the next day. 🤣 My dad and B added the x features on the counters.. and since it was last minute that was done one Sunday evening right as we arrived home from a dance competition weekend… and took til midnight. Paint was happening at 8am the following morning so it HAD to be done THAT night. I’m SO glad I added those because I feel like they MAKE the kitchen remodel.

It literally feels like a different house. It brightened it up so much. I struggled painting the custom cabinets because they were only 8 years old and were still beautiful but they just didn’t work with the bright white counters. My biggest push was that they were also black INSIDE and impossible to see in my lower cabinets. The painters were willing to paint the insides also and it’s probably one of my favorite changes of the whole re-do!

On the counter tops– I STRESSED over this.. to the point that I created a poll on my IG stories. Haha. (But seriously.. I did.) I originally chose granite.. but after researching granite vs. quartz.. and the pros (to me) outweighing the cons on quartz OVER granite.. I went with quartz. The final deciding point was when I went to view the granite in person before they cut it.. it had some purple flecks in it that I didn’t see in the photos originally.. and while it was gorgeous stone, it was not what I was wanting for the kitchen. I wanted more of a clean look.. and the granite was just too busy for me. ALSO– for those that are local.. another deciding factor for me was that the quartz we used was the SAME price point as the granite I originally chose!! SO there was NO additional cost for the quartz (which is typically more costly than granite.)

If you are in this process, going to be soon OR considering a remodel and this is something you’re going to have to consider.. just for the record, I am 110% happy with my decision on the quartz!! (But it didn’t come easily.) I can be SO indecisive over home stuff. I’m night and day with my business and making decisions for things in the house. I can envision concepts and setups for my business.. I have them styled and planned in my head before I even begin purchasing or searching for the pieces I need to carry it out and bring them all together!! However with the house, I cannot imagine it.. I have to see and feel it.. and even then I’m going to stress over it until it’s complete… and then turn to friends for their opinions more than once as well! haha.

Along with everyone else in the world, I watched the Marie Kondo shoe on Netflix earlier this year and have since, been on a mission to “spark joy” in every room of the house. Hahah. But seriously. Not everything I have planned is as big of an undertaking as the kitchen.. (however the bathrooms are still “under construction” AND we have an even bigger undertaking coming up soon as well.. but I’m also refreshing the walls a little with changing some decor up.. repainted a few pieces of furniture to brighten up the house.. and giving some rooms that have been neglected on the decor side (like Beau’s room and our guest room) a little TLC (easy stuff) so that EVERY room “sparks joy” when you walk in! I’ll chalk some of this madness up to the winter and the lack of sunshine we’ve had.. BUT my list is also things that I have wanted to change for a LONG time anyway… and the winter blues just lit a fire under me to do so. But B will vouch that I do some level of this every year around this time (usually just cleaning out and purging the house) because I know it’s the “calm” before the storm of the Spring busy season.. and my last change for the foreseeable future to concentrate any energy on something over than my business, haha. Wish us luck… these “little jobs” are already starting to run over into the beginning of busy season!

I want to give credit to some of the amazing businesses we worked with and I’ll link to some of the fixtures, etc. for anyone that is interested!

AND I’d love to have you leave a comment and let me know how you think it turned out!!!!

New Quartz Countertops- The Counter Top Shop

Repainted Existing Backsplash- Jennifer Lassiter (Parisian Class With Southern Sass)

Repainted Existing Cabinets- M.A. Jestic Painting

Cabinet/Drawer Pulls- Amazon

Sink- Home Depot

Faucet- Home Depot

Pendant Lights- Wayfair

Island Light- Pottery Barn (Already had this, but people always ask. I tried to link it but looks like it’s no longer available.)

Barstools- Amazon

Cabinet Paint- Behr Whisper White

Wall Color- Sherwin Williams Rare Gray (this is the original paint color when we built the home– but I get asked this color a lot. It’s the only original paint color I can remember too! haha)

Backsplash Paint- Mixture of Ultra White, Sherwin Williams White Flour and Sherwin Williams Rare Grey then distressed. 

Under Cabinet Lighting- This is also something I already had, but highly recommend it and wanted to include it! Super cheap and I installed it myself.

Main Kit – Extra Cords for additional Lighting – Additional Lights

 

Excuse the picture quality– these are just iPhone pictures. The painters are coming back to do some touchups and we have 1 cabinet door off (that isn’t pictured) because we added a pull out trash can ourselves and are waiting for the rest of the hardware to attach the door to come in, but everything else is pretty much done.

 

A few before pictures:

 

AND NOW.. the AFTER!

ONE MORE look at the before and after transformation!!!