Thank you for all of your comments and compliments... You have reminded me not to rush into changing things. The house has alot of trim work throughout, including on the dining room ceiling, dining room walls, living room, windows, entry/foyer, doorways, etc...In those areas, all the trim has been painted white, but it appears to be the same style and type as what's in the kitchen/family room. I guess I was thinking that the rest of the trim work should be white too. But, I see now that it doesn't have to match and will leave a bit of character to the family room! The wood for the built-ins do appear to be an upgrade over the kitchen cabinets. As much as I love the look of all white trim, the family room has such a warm feeling, as is, so I will probably just keep any furniture in the room light for contrast and accent with color. I will definitely not rush to change to quickly! Some of our main reasons for choosing the new home is because it was custom built, is loaded with trim work and moldings and is in an older neighborhood with lots of large trees and yards. Of course, there is also plenty of shiny brass in all of the bathrooms, door handles and foyer lighting that we will be busy replacing. And, the landscaping needs some updating from the overly manicured large bushes surrounding the front entryway of the home. I may have trouble with interior design/decor, but I am in my element with landscaping and yard work! I appreciate all the comments about the kitchen...My husband and I have done a lot of work ourselves in our current home. He does most of our home repairs too; he hates hiring out! Life has gotten extremely hectic these days, so we have less time for DIY work like the time it would take to do paint the cabinets. But, I think we can easily handle the backsplash and modifying the cabinets with beadboard on the sides, but will find someone for counters/sink and help with whatever we do to the cabinets. It sounds like if we have to hire someone to paint the cabinets, it might put us way over our current budget. While I still love my inspiration kitchen photo, I may entertain the idea of darkening the stain/refacing the existing cabinets, possibly painting the center island as one of you mentioned and updating the counters, sink and adding backsplash and other details. This would buy us time (and save us money), until we can afford to get the wood floors we want and the painting of the cabinets the way GreenDay detailed. I appreciate all the advice.

The reason I want to paint the cabinets is because they are 20 years old and can stand a refresher of paint. Husband is going to rebuild the top cabinet doors to be squared like the bottom cabinet doors. Yeah! So now I want to reconsider the piece that goes in front of the window. Husband can cut a new shape. I think the current one is old fashion. I need to get more pictures because alittle more work has been done. The cabinet box has been hung, along with the microwave. The cabinet doors still need to be made. I got black counter stools. So I've decide to go with black or bronze for the cabinet hardware. What I'm thinking now is to do a beige paint over the cabinets like Bradstreet Beige. And that should help break up the white. And I'm also not sold on the tile samples I have. Maybe I need to go bolder but cant decide. So some think the cabinets should not be white. What would you suggest? I like white cabinets but its still a possibility to paint them a new color. This is the before shot

Ok, I just got done redoing m 1980's honey oak kitchen with a white vinyl floor, so I can relate to what you're wanting. If you want to reconfigure the kitchen, please spend the money and hire a designer, as all above have mentioned. You don't need a design/build person at this point, but a good kitchen designer. If you live someplace where its hard to find such a person, you can find one on here who can work with you remotely! We didn't change the configuration much, though we did yank out a pantry and instead designed a whole wall of cabinets to take up the "eat in" portion of the kitchen. Given that we didnt' reconfigure, I relied on my own choices, and good contractors to make it happen. For the new wall of cabinets, I simply worked with the kitchen person where I bought the cabinets. Lessons learned: get the plan, and the estimated budget, in place before you do a single piece of work. Build 15% contingency into that budget. If you're doing it without a general, make sure you get good advice about how to sequence the work to minimize the pain. Its worth it in the end, but it takes patience.

Cool, Anglophilia. I didn't get a KD for my new kitchen because I (like you) didn't trust HD or other big boxes on doing it, and nor did I seem (as far as I know/knew) to have a KD in this area not associated with a line or so of products that I'd be forced into choosing from. Instead, I basically utilized the resources here at the Kitchen Forum to hone down some of my thought processes, and they helped me make a better kitchen than I would otherwise have created on my own. (Under counter drawers; ice, water, stone, fire; landing spot before fridge, induction range, a prep sink, even the brand of sink I went with... a few other things like the entry to the pantry...) Yes, I didn't take every bit of advice, but I certainly appreciated it all. If I knew of a reliable KD in my area who I knew up front (this is hard to determine...) wasn't promoting his or her own line, I may have considered. And again, as long as I have the choice to do certain specific elements to my own needs, after fully considering suggestions I will usually take, a KD could be very useful. EDIT: As of this date, are there things I wish I had done that I neglected? No. Well, discounting the things the GC didn't do that I requested, but I'm so done with 98% of the build (most right but ... ) that I no longer care about those little specific things... place for vertical pans... the amount of drawers vs cabs I originally specified... I gotta remain focused elsewhere.