Hello from across the pond both of you! Xuan! How your little precious gift these days? My Mom says hello to you and Josh. Now, how did you get that plant to color like that? Look at the growth and the colors. I LOVE it. How can I get one, boy, there I go again..lol Wait, I am serious here. Josh, how can I get on from you? I love this tree. Hoping you are thriving Xuan:-) Mike

I am always so amazed by your beautiful tropical garden!! It looks wonderful!

Wow--what a difference just opening up that space where the upper cabs and peninsula were! Can't wait to see the new kitchen unfold.

Oh wow, thanks everybody!! To be described as "kitchen porn" by RM...haha. Enjoy your nanaimo bars, I'll be eating tv dinners for a little longer. I've read a couple of comments about size, and we love it of course. BUT the only reason we could afford this house was how poorly it showed by the agent, and the rooms that were just icky. When we bought the house three years ago we had a ton of things to do and have been renovating/fixing/redecorating ever since!! So all you're seeing is the result, but there were many years of people coming to our house and looking room to room and going - oh, you need to renovate this room too?? It's a true fixer-upper and has been a ton of work. We would not have been able to do this having kids, and I know many of you do have small children. So we have sacrificed starting a family in order to fix our house first!! This is the reality behind the "porn" if you will, just like how they Photoshop all the kitchen magazines, and how the (not-as-good analogy) porn star was really forced into the industry due to having low self-esteem. As a reality check, here are some before pics of the kitchen. We painted the ugly laminate cabs that smelled terrible, and replaced the mouth-like hardware: This was the result: Our amazing "cooking area": And here is a pic of just one of the bathrooms we need to renovate, just to give you an idea of the state its in. No pretty, inset cabinets here!! Boysrus2 - I'm so sorry to hear about lack of progress. We were sitting around for 3 weeks as well to figure out a custom stain AND book a new stainer. It was frustrating...and we're technically getting our granite 3.5 weeks after they measured which is quite uncommonly long. So don't you worry, your time will come too. I just got reminded of my old floors. Can you imagine how different the feel would be if we decided to stick with them? Much more "country" in feel and would clash with the cabinets.