You have so many options!

1) Your house is almost palatial for an NYC flat. Check out websites and books devoted to small spaces and see how you can make it function bigger than it is.

2) There's a beautiful area with houses that are just old enough for the problems to shake out to which you'd like to move. If everything is right about the neighborhood, and the house will work for you not just now but for another 20 years at least into the future, you have a great place to go. So do it! And get creative. The kitchen looks functional, so it's just a matter of prettying it up.

Re ugly floor: It's neutral. It's easy to clean. It's easy to ignore.

It's harder to ignore the granite, but it's also pretty neutral. And there's a lot of it. You can put some accessories that you really like on it. Add a mosaic backsplash that pulls the color from the granite so it all blends well. Paint the walls a nice pale neutral. Or if you're willing to be brave with less popular colors, a taupe.

(3) If you can get a good deal on the house, add some cash out for renovations to the loan. Donate as much as you can salvage from the kitchen to Habitat or similar, and do it up your way.

I feel for you!

Would painting the cabinets in the new kitchen help?...I have painted a floor before too...the granite's a harder fix. Hmmmm. You're making me wonder about our plans for adding a dog to the mix...

GL

hi, i like your kitchen, too. :) anyway, we didn't leave a great kitchen, but we did move to a place with a yuck kitchen because of the location. so i can really understand your reluctance. you seem very talented at creating a space you love, so wherever you go, i'm sure you can do the same... even if it's not a major remodel. good luck!

Painting cabinets is always an option, as it everything else above that was mentioned. Could you add on to your home to accommodate your needs?

You made a really cool kitchen in your current home! That tells me two things--that you can make a great kitchen in your future home, and that a great kitchen is really important to you.

We moved from a house where I had put in a fantastic new kitchen exactly to my own specifications and desires. We rent out that house now, and I can't bear to visit because it pains me to see the wonderful kitchen. It's so much nicer than my current kitchen is or ever will be. Boo hoo hoo.

If you are sure you want to move, then take your time and find a house that really seems worth the loss of the lovely kitchen you have now. But I'd question whether you really want to move. Or move right now. If you can't afford to redo the kitchen now, maybe you could stay where you are and save money towards the future new kitchen, so you can remodel soon after you move. Or perhaps you can wait and find a house where the kitchen really needs remodeling and that is reflected in a lower price.

If you are considering moving, but don't have to move right now, then you can afford to take you time and really attend to your feelings about the kitchen.

BEAUTIFUL kitchen now. The new kitchen reminds me of ours. Here are some ideas to mimic your current kitchen style in the new one:
* DO paint the cabinets a creamy white and add brushed silver hardware just like your kitchen.

* Can you bring your wonderful pendant lights with you and swap them out for something cheap from a BigBox store?

* Don't worry about the floor. It's neutral and will do fine.

*Add new pullasters (supports) on the island. Even maybe find a marble slab for the island that mimics your current one.

* change out the appliances over the time to stainless.

I really don't think you're too far from your ideal. You are very talented, and can add a lot of YOU to your new digs. Good luck!!

The layout of the new kitchen looks adequate enough. I would paint the cabinets in a great color. I personally would do a fun and fabulous color that would work with the granite well rather than white. Light yellow? Sage Green? Cool Grey? Two toned with rich brown/navy blue at the bottom, lighter warmer color at the top. I think painted cabinets will give a warm glow and richness to the house. Take out the 4 inch granite backsplash and have fun with the tiled backsplash.

The upper cabinets look cheap because there is too much space at the top between the cabinets and the ceiling. I would have the custom cabinet people make some decorative boxes or second layer of uppers there so you can put pottery, baskets, etc up there. If you are painting the rest of the cabs, this will be easy to match. There is enough space there for the second row.

I would replace a few doors, including a few in the dining area, with glass inserts or open shelves to open up the space a little. The solid uppers make the kitchen closed in.

I would get new appliances that you LOVE if you can afford them.

I think you can do alot with that kitchen with not that much money. (Good paint job can be expensive, however.) I would think of the location, the house layout, the architectural appeal of the house and then kitchen in that order when chosing a house.

Yes the floor is not very pretty. Is it tile or vinyl? if it is vinyl, it is not that much to replace the floor to get you through for a few years.

Good luck.

Plllog, I am going to check out some books. I have got a few good ideas from apartment therapy. If I could make the rest of my house function like my kitchen, we may stay. The house will be paid off in 5 years and our taxes are low here.

still lynnski, we would also be renting out this place. Not only would i miss it and be boo-hoo-hooing like you, but I would be freaking out if my kitchen and appliances were not being taken care of, ya know?

Thank you all for your wonderful ideas! I need to sit down with DH and make a pros and cons list for moving vs staying.

I agree with a lot of the suggestions for sprucing up the new kitchen, but I wouldn't try to recreate your old one. In my experience, it never works and leads to disappointment. Find a new look that you also love.

You could always consider moving into a fixer. You said you've looked at some lovely houses... what about the ugly duckling?

Now that you have experience you may be in an ideal position to do an even BETTER job on the next place... And get exactly what you want next time around. If you can afford some overlap in time you could do the remodel while still leaving in the old home.

Is an ugly duckling a possibility?

caligal, you may not have been on here for a long time, but I was just reading several of your old responses yesterday - popcorn ceilings maybe? I've only been on since last fall, so all the old stuff is new for me, and we're just talking about the popcorn ceiling problem now.

You can make this new kitchen work for you if you really want to move, but you're right, the current one is much nicer. Don't blame the dog for needing more room, though! Goldens are happiest at your feet, on your lap, or on your bed (says the woman with a golden retriever head in her lap).

The hardest part of reinventing your current house to make it function larger is the dog. Do you have a yard where he can run around? A dog park? That helps. Borzois, for example, are large in stature dogs which take up very little indoor space (though they need to run). Goldens, while being kind of iconic dog dogs, seem to just be big. That's the first thing I'd address. I don't know how one can fit a dog like that into a space that's designed all for people, so it will probably make the people space feel larger if there's a dog space that's all his, where he feels comfortable. When I say "all his" I don't mean isolated, because no dog would like that, but a place where no one is pushing him away or stepping on him or picking up his toys (if he has them) and taking them away. A place where your son can play with the dog, as well, and not be in the way. It could be a corner with a dog bed or dog chair, and maybe a small rug that defines the space where the dog toys go.

For a child's room, plan for the coming teenager. A captain's bed (drawers underneath) or loft bed (desk underneath) gives a lot of dual purposing to the space, and is also kind of cool. High shelves make a lot of use of otherwise wasted space. If you're in earthquake territory, you can use gallery rails or bungees to keep things from falling on heads for the first bit of shaking.

In any small space, a few larger pieces of furniture usually works better than lots of smaller ones. If you have a bunch of bookcases, tables, stands, and small cupboards, try making one large storage wall. Include a place to put a grabber and a step or stool.

Little tricks include getting a smaller table with self-storage for leaf(s) and using the extra chairs for other purposes, desk chair, bedroom chair, etc., so that they're easy to bring in for company, but you're not tripping over them when they're not in use.

There's a book called 500 Ideas for Small Spaces: Easy Solutions for Living in 1000 Square Feet or Less that looks pretty good. There's enough cluttery stuff in the pictures that it looks realistic rather than like a staged pipe dream. Libby Langdon's Small Space Solutions: Secrets for Making Any Room Look Elegant and Feel Spacious on Any Budget has promise. She has some good examples on maximizing floorplans, for instance. Small Spaces: Maximizing Limited Spaces for Living has a style more like yours, though I don't know how much practical stuff is in it. How to Live in Small Spaces: Design, Furnishing, Decoration and Detail for the Smaller Home has some more out of the norm ideas.

When you're looking for books beware of biases. There are some small space design books that are aimed at homes that are more than double the size of yours! (I'd call that moderate or medium, not small!)

If you have high enough ceilings so this loft/desk/dresser/storage unit isn't overwhelming, it's a great way to pack a lot of usefulness in a small space. The desk pulls out and stores underneath. The "play nook", a large cubby hole between the desk and the storage stairs (drawers in each riser) becomes good storage for sporting/camping equipment for an older kid.

Berg makes many versions of these with the storage stairs and all kinds of clever built-ins.

Oh man! I was in the EXACT situation as you lol. We lived in a tiny ranch home and I HATED to leave my kitchen! We had custom alder cabinets, granite , tumbled marble backsplash and it opened up outside (we live in California) to a cool courtyard with tumbled coblestone pavers.

OK, I still miss those things but let me tell you..so awesome having a big 2 story home with a pool, big lot etc. I would never in a million years go back to living in my old home but I still miss that very light bright kitchen!

We are re-doing our kitchen now and it will be smaller than my old home. I love when all the kids come over to playdates b/c we just send them upstairs or the huge living room and DH have peace & quite.

DH told me when we moved in (almost 2 years now ??) we simply cannot do our kitchen but he surprised me and said we can do it NOW.

I do love your old kitchen but example of the kitchen you'd be moving into is paradise compared to the one I have now. (I like the kitchen!!!)
Our oven not working, plastic falling apart cabinets with a chronic leaky faucet, hideous dirty tile.

We've been casually looking too. ugh. very casual. just online looking... Part of me wants to find my exact kitchen in another house, but bigger. And the other part of me wants to find a house I love that has the worst kitchen on the planet that I can gut and make my own.

Isn't it horrible when the realtor lists the kitchen as modern and updated and yet as a TKO person, we know better....

Don't underestimate your talents to make the next kitchen that much better.

After remodeling our previous homes kitchen that we had lived in for almost 15years, we found a home that we had virtually given up on finding. It had NEARLY everything that we had wanted but I knew (or thought I knew) we would have to forever give up having the features we had in our previous kitchen especially the huge island.

But low and behold, when we started to "tweak" the floor plan, we thought outside the box enough to have just as great if not greater kitchen then ever before.

Your kitchen is great but if the rest of the house doesn't work, it will be difficult to live in long term. With all the things we have to do on our current house, it was an easy house not to fall in love with. We love our new home.

980 sq ft is small for three plus a golden, so I can understand wanting a larger home in (hopefully) a good school district. But low taxes in CA is good, so have you explored what an addition to your current house will cost and do to you property tax? If it costs more than can be justified or your lot is too small or the existing structure cannot accommodate a second story, you've gotten great ideas to make the new kitchen look good for about $5k with new SS appliances from Ebay or local scratch & dent outlets. Hide some of the floor with nice runners and rugs, paint the corbels so that they disappear, and make the existing cabinets work with paint and/or a couple of glass inserts. We built our dream home, sold it and wound up with a natural cherry kitchen not dissimilar to what you posted and a far cry from our contemporary white one we left. After making a few changes to fit our style, it was fine. We've since moved again and I have just completed another (white contemporary) kitchen. Embrace the possibilities!

One little idea if you decide to do a loft bed as plllog describes (great idea, btw!) Try to find/make one that holds an extra long mattress. DH made one of these for my young teenage cousin only to have him outgrow it about two years later. He LOVED his loft bed, but it "shrank" terribly on him and they had to sell it. A little fore-planning and a long mattress would have prevented that.

If there is no rush, keep looking until you find something you are excited about. You may find something where you can afford to redo the kitchen, or you may find one with a kitchen you actually like. Or, the house as a package will knock you out enough to not mind a mediocre kitchen...

You have no deadline hanging over your head, so don't settle. There is a great house out there waiting for you.
BTW - your current kitchen is so much nicer than the one for sale.

Been there. Done that. Had a house we loved, in a neighborhood we loved, with a school we loved. Moved into the house with 2 kids.... as our family stretched to 4 kids, the house was just too small. I organized that house, micromanaged every inch of it... we put blood, sweat and tears into it... and eventually a dream kitchen into it... and as our 4th passed 1 yr, it just wasn't working. No matter what I did, the house wouldn't work for us... and there were a few safety issues that were brought to light by that very daring 4th... we racked our brains, trying to decide if we should add on, but that just didn't make sense financially - plus there were a few things we wanted that we couldn't get with that house.

So I gave up my kitchen. I got to have my beautiful kitchen for about 17 months. I still miss my kitchen. But I don't miss being so cramped that I couldn't turn around without hitting 5 things. And what did we get in return... well, it's been a bit over 2 year since we moved... I'm in a very large house. A house which has been ignored since the day it was built nearly 30 years ago - unbelievably, still a blank builders canvas. I'm ITCHING to get to the kitchen - I've spent more hours (days, weeks, months) than I care to admit drawing layouts and researching appliances... I've had my future kitchen put on hold for a major emergency bathroom remodel... It's looking like the roof/gutter situation is about to bump the kitchen yet again.... I've told our GC if he finds something else wrong before I get to the kitchen, we really ought to get a freebie somewhere...

and yet I'm happy. My family is happy. We are in another good neighborhood, with another good school... and now my youngest is much safer (she repeated tried to "kill" herself in the old house)... the kids have more room to be kids... it's a good thing for us.

Talk with your hubby, find out what is going to work best for your family and your family's happiness. Maybe it is staying in your current home. Maybe it's moving. Only you guys can know. But the move from our 1300 square foot home for a family of 6, plus cat, plus labrador... to a 3600square foot home ended up being a wonderful blessing. Even though my kitchen is, dare I say it, old, falling apart, and not enough storage... and doesn't really have enough space for a table for us... (yes our table is in the kitchen, it's just makes it crowded).

Good luck.

No real suggestions here except to tell you I understand! I've told my DH on many occasions that if we ever move, my kitchen goes with us!

Wow, I really miss this community. I may need to re-do a kitchen just to hang out here. You are all so knowledgeable and helpful!

So many different ideas and perspectives. I can't add on due to lot size and we won't go up. My husband refuses to have a house with stairs due to his bad knees.

The bed suggestion was a nice one, but our son has a full size bed and it's a good thing because our dog sleeps on the end of it. He is turning 13 and has his room, plus what we call the den (tv & game room). It gets a little crowded if he has more than 2 friends in that room.

I do think we will continue to look for a house that has more of a kitchen I love, or at least see potential in. In the meantime I will see what else I can do to maximize the spaces in each room.

Someone mentioned having a space for our dog. We actually do have an area he goes to in the living room. It is an entryway we rarely use. His giant pillow fits there and it is a little quiet area where he can still observe his family.

Again, thanks and I will be checking back for other's advice and experiences!

Davis loves this area of the kitchen best. Tries to sneak in a pre-cleaning if I give him the chance.

I totally hear you. We lived in a small 1200 sq ft, 2 bd 1 bath house in La Mesa, CA. We re-did our kitchen and though it was small, it was super functional. When DH took a new job in Brentwood, CA (NorCal), we moved into a newer, much larger house (2810 sq ft) with it's much larger kitchen. It had everything our old kitchen didn't have, a walk in pantry, an island, tons of counter space, and of course a ton of cabinets. In fact, it was laid out nearly exactly the same as the the sample oak kitchen you posted, except the oven was next to the refrigerator. Unfortunately, it did NOT function well, at all. All those cabinets and no deep drawers meant it was hard to access. I spent a lot of time on my knees on hard tile looking for things that had fallen in the back of the cabinet. Outside of the kitchen, the house had a ton of space, so much that we didn't use a good portion of it. The house was too new to justify pulling anything out or re-doing. Plus the cost of the new house was waaaay more money, so our higher monthly payment meant we couldn't afford much more than wall paint.

I would seriously consider purging your personal items, books, movies, old clothes etc and keep only what you NEED. Invest in e-readers and subscribe to streaming video services like Netflix. Also scale down furniture or build in shelving in bedrooms around beds and family areas so that you maximize every inch for storage. Use your vertical space. It might cost you up front to build storage, but it will be a lot cheaper than selling your current home and buying a bigger house. Remember you have to add in all the costs to repair any deferred maintenance, heaven forbid there's any wood rot or termite damage, plus any spruce ups for selling, plus realtor commissions. Moving can get very expensive. Don't forget movers fees or truck rental if you DIY.

Bigger is not necessarily better. Check out Sarah Susanka's Not So Big House books. Her theory is that a well laid out space is better than lots of square footage.

As for my personal saga, we stayed in our bigger house for about 3 years before we sold and moved out of state (TX). Here, we went smaller. Our current house is about 2400 sq ft. We now have 3 kids and 2 beagles, plus DH works from home. I still have some wasted space (formal living/dining), but we use the majority of the house every day. Here we have a cheaper house price compared to CA, so we have a bit of extra money to invest in the house/kitchen. After the kitchen is done, we'll be looking into combining the formal spaces into the family room so that we can really use every sq ft.
Here's my old tiny kitchen - cleaned for move:

Here's the NorCal kitchen staged to sell:

Yes, Kathec, the kitchen in No. Cal is almost identical to the house we were considering.

In my current kitchen and your tiny kitchen everything is so accessible. I have the perfect triangle in my kitchen and more prep space here:

I think I am going to check out all the books that have been suggested. I want to do a built-in in the closet of the 3rd bedroom/den. We have a flat screen in the closet now, but it could house so much more. I think I can also put something at the end of my hall. Make some changes and give it one more year. My son is in 7th grade and can stay in the same school for 8th grade.

I just never thought this was going to be my forever home. It was a five year plan that has turned into 20 years!

See what you mean, Caligal. If you move, when you feel you can, donate the old (new) cabinets to a good cause, take the writeoff, and bring in some more nice inexpensive Ikea. The counters might be more expensive to replace, or not, but the idea's the same: Why consider yourself en thrall to things you don't like just because they're there? They belong to you, not vice versa.

We lived in a huge house in the middle of nowhere, remodeled the kitchen (loved it!) and then decided, not even 2 years later, to move because....house conveniently located in middle of nowhere and driving kids 1 hour up a mountain to school was getting old. Fast.

Your kitchen is adorable and I can definitely relate to hating to leave it. We found a house we liked with a terrible kitchen knowing that all the so-so kitchens out there weren't for us. So when we remodeled, we did not feel terrible ripping the thing out.

That being said, I don't think the kitchen in the house you posted is terrible. But you know that. Granted, it is not that cute. Kind of standard. But totally big!

I had to do a double take on Kathec's kitchen...looked like Caligal's possible new one! Wouldn't have known the difference if it wasn't for the appliance colors.

Anyway, I think everything is livable except for the backsplash. I can see how you wouldn't like the floor tile. Good luck with your decision. I know it can be painful, but there is more to life than cute kitchens. Or so I hear...haven't totally convinced myself of this yet ;)

sabjimata, thanks for the story and complements. The more I am talking about leaving, the more I see that I want to stay.

There is a little more to life than cute kitchens, but not too much more :0). I have become a real homebody and spend a very large part of my day here at home and in the kitchen.

I feel your pain. I LOVE my current house, but it was so hard to leave our old house because it had a wonderful kitchen, and the one in this house had just been redone (in lovely oak, kitchen carpet, green formica countertops, and green plaid wallpaper). We knew that if we bought this house, it would be years before we could remodel the kitchen. Now, here we are 6 years later and finally doing it. I don't regret moving, but it was definitely hard to leave that kitchen and smaller cute house behind.

I agree with the others that if space is your major worry, see what you can do to maximize what you already have. It will certainly be cheaper than moving. :o) For us, we went from 5 kids to 12, so staying in our old 2000 sq ft/4 bedroom home just wouldn't have worked.

Caligal, it really sounds like you want to stay with your current home. However, I'll just point out that right now the inventory of foreclosed homes gives people unprecedented chances to obtain homes they could not hope to have before and many will not be able to afford in future (let's hope no more such "wonderful" home markets).

I don't mean go looking just for a bigger home (although in your case some additional size would be nice), but rather a lifestyle improvement: A decent home in a location that is particularly desirable to you. You know, location, location, location. Things like good schools, a pretty sociable neighborhood, close to family, en route between friends and mall (they'll be dropping in), favorite amenities close by (cows in pastures or high-density shopping, your choice), good proximity and transportion to work. Whatever floats your boat.

If you're not already in a place you'd really like to raise your children and even be happy growing old, this current opportunity to make your home there should not be passed up for any but the most important reasons.

Rosie, don't forget that although there's likely more houses in her price range that may have been out of reach a few years ago, selling her current house could take some time due to the same reason. This can be a tricky situation if you decide to buy a house, but your current house sits on the market. Then you have to be prepared to pay 2 mortgage payments. That can be a major financial strain especially when you add in all those additional costs I mentioned earlier.

Also many people are abandoning their houses and mailing the keys back to the bank. They call it sending jingle mail. My husband's aunt and cousin did this in SoCal. Their house was worth less than they paid, so they opted to get out all together. It's a terrible thing to do, but it's happening all the time. Some lenders have a lot of houses on their books, but they don't put them on the market to keep from completely flooding the market.

We have a small home (maybe 1100sq. ft.) ~ 2 bed, 2 bath and raised two sons and numerous animals here. I ALWAYS wanted to larger place; but my husband is very satisfied where we're at.

Now both my sons are on their own and the house is perfect for us (even tho I always feel the need to redo this and redo that!!).

When my sons were growing up, even tho we seemed to have the smallest house (with only a Michigan basement), ALL the kids congregated here!!! Our home was a welcome mat for any kid who felt like stopping over; and yes, some times I felt they were taking over the whole house!!!

If you like your house, you can make it work for you. Size is not the most important thing. Use some of the suggestions listed above and see how they work for you. My sons love our small house and have never felt cheated out of not having their own room, a rec room, etc., etc., etc.

Keep us posted as to what you decide ;)

jody

Oh, Caligal, I would hate to leave your kitchen, too! It is not just cute, but knowing IKEA as I do, it is so darned functional!

Just remember the most of what makes a home a home is the family that lives there. You will put your own special caligal touches on it, fresh paint, and you can make it more your own until you can do something bigger down the line. And there's always IKEA.... ;^)

I just wanted to add that I think Davis is soooo cute! Yes hims is! Yes hims is! *in my babykittypuppy voice*

jjean, thanks for sharing. My son doesn't want to move and loves our house. We are in a good school district, have lovely walking paths with abundant trees, nice neighbors, walking distance to the library, and association pools & parks. Our association fee is super low too. Good shopping centers with dairy farms dotted along the way.

I guess I would be pretty sad to leave, too! Funny I grew up in a house this size with 2 more bodies and many more pets. At least I have 2 bathrooms. I have fond memories of my cozy childhood home.

Guess I need to head over to the small homes forum!!!

I will still be checking back here to see comments! Thanks everyone!

Thanks Shelayne, you are so right! Yes, Davis is a furry cute beast!

Oh, I can so relate. The four of us were living in a 1100 sq ft house that had a horrible layout overall, and a 9X9 ft kitchen--including the countertops. No built in dishwasher.
We looked at house after house, many much nicer overall than the one we had, but the kitchens...awful! Not one that I would want to live with, but if we spent the money on the house, we would have nothing left for the kitchen.
Why do they build such nice houses with such abysmal kitchens?

In our case, we put on an addition and renovated the entire house to make it 'live bigger'. It's still not big, only 1500 sq ft, but it's way more comfortable.

So, no new advice (you've gotten plenty of good suggestions above) but lots of sympathy.

Cj

Thanks Cj, I am actually wanting to hear
from people who have stayed in their homes.
I too, wonder why the kitchens in a lot of
the new homes (1800-2300sq ft) were kind of
afterthoughts. To get a really nice kitchen
here, you need to buy a 3000 sq ft home and
that is way too much home for us.