How I Spent My Christmas Vacation

I had all these grand plans of sharing lots of tutorials from the gingerbread decorating party, having all sorts of relaxing time to write blog posts, over the Christmas/New Year holidays.  We weren't hosting extended family this year, my husband had the week off work and could take care of the girls--yes, this was going to be a productive yet stress free week!

And then my oven broke.  A few days before Christmas.

Now, I've never been in love with my kitchen, but I did see the potential in it.

But we'd just bought a new washer and dryer in November, and weren't planning on re-doing the kitchen for at least another year!

We were going to get another 30" range and slide it in, but if I had to buy a new oven, it was darn well going to have a gas range.  We have gas to the house, but it was never piped to the kitchen.  That means plumbers and permits and inspections.  My husband got a bit of sticker shock when I presented the oven I wanted to get.  "Is there something else we could find?  Something on Craigslist, maybe?" he asked.

Why yes, dear.  Yes there was.  In fact, it seemed like the deal of the century.  But it would involve more elbow grease and re-imagining our kitchen a bit.

I bought a gorgeous set of Thermador double ovens, a 36" Thermador gas cooktop, and matching 36" Thermador hood, all for $700.  In perfect condition, just a few years old.  They're SOOO PRETTY!

In the end, we'll end up spending more than just the new slide-in range would have cost.  But we'll end up with an entirely new kitchen, with gorgeous appliances and sparkling new granite countertops.  We're doing most of the work ourselves, and this is pretty much what our kitchen looks like now:

That's my completely awesome dad being an incredible help while he was in town.  He built that double oven cabinet for us, since Cabinets to Go doesn't have double oven cabinets.  Can you believe we hosted our annual New Year's Eve pizza party in this chaos?  Lots of paper plates and plastic cups and good friends who forgive our messes.  It's good to have the outdoor kitchen and gorgeous weather in the forecast!

The cabinets come in at the end of the week...

...and as long as everything is ripped out, of course I'm going to repaint!  I still love the orange I painted when we moved in, but after four years, I'm ready for a change.  

This is about the grand sum of our cooking facilities at the moment:

So I've been pretty preoccupied recently, but it really is my resolution to be a better blogger this year!  I swear, I really do have fun tutorials and posts lined up...at least conceptually.  ;-)