Kitchen Dreams: Be Careful What You Wish For

My mom likes to tell a story from early on in my parents’ marriage about how she helped my dad understand the cost of groceries. Theirs was a typical marriage for the time, when most women did not work outside of the home and the men earned the income for the household.

When Dad griped one too many times about how much money she was spending on groceries, Mom decided to give him a lesson in home economics: She took him to the grocery store with her. He had no idea just how much milk, eggs, bread, meat, cheese and all the other essentials cost. Only when he saw with his own eyes the price of the items on her grocery list did he finally comprehend that she was not frivolously wasting money at the store.

Reality has a way of opening our eyes.

For years, I have wanted to remodel my kitchen. While it is nicer than the kitchens of the various apartments I lived in previously, my kitchen offers very limited storage and counter space and insufficient task lighting. All the counters and backsplashes are covered in small, square ceramic tiles that look nice but result in what seems like miles of grout lines that are virtually impossible to keep clean.

When we finally decided to take the plunge and remodel, I naively thought I could just head to the nearest kitchen remodeling store, pick out a few cabinets, sign on the dotted line and have a new kitchen installed a couple weeks later.

I was in for a major reality check.

Since that day when we first decided to make my kitchen dreams come true, I have learned that remodeling costs a whole lot more than I expected. It also requires more planning, decisions and work than I imagined. If you want to end up with the kitchen of your dreams, you have to think about every little detail.

What are you going to store in your cabinets, and how do you use these items? Do you want drawers or doors? Knobs or handles? How many lights and what kind? Where will you put your pots and pans and silverware and small appliances, and what kind of cabinet will house them? Are you traditional, contemporary or somewhere in the middle? ‘What kind of wood and finish do you prefer?

Each of the decisions you make comes with a price tag. Cherry costs more than maple. Granite costs more than laminate. The more detail a door style has, the higher the price.

It’s absolutely mind boggling.

Seven months and infinite decisions later, my kitchen remodel has begun. The contents of my former kitchen are now in my dining room. We are washing dishes in the bathroom sink and dining out constantly or eating anything that can be cooked in a microwave. We have to walk through plastic-covered doorways to get to our family room and basement, and the sounds of drills and hammers are our constant background music.

This story is still being written, but after the last nail is hammered home, I hope I’ll be living (or cooking) my dream.

Until then, please remind me why I wanted this so much.