Well, for $450, it's may not be worth your time and tool investment if you're doing this to save money. If you're doing this because you like projects like this, that's another story. But you will still barely save any money. If you already do have the tools, then you have to be able to cut a REALLY straight line with them. Or it will show in comparison to the cabinets. That means you have to be pretty comfortable with your table saw, or very very consistant with a circular saw and a jig. If you're doing MDF (HEAVY compared to plywood), that's $50 a 4x8 sheet (actually 49"x97") for 3/4" A hand held router will be easier to use, but a table router will give you more consistant results on easing the edges. Are these going to be shaker "panels", or just simple flat panels? There's a whole other bit of complexity to the finished shaker panels than the just the flat panels, and if that's what your'e comparing $$ quotes with, then not just no, but hell no, it's not worth the dollars to make your own.

dianalo, I'd love to see your Applad kitchen if you care to post photos! I think I remember seeing a shot of your drawers with the vintage pulls -- that was yours, right? The only problem I have with the idea of Applad uppers is that we have slab white uppers now, and they look kind of stark covering the whole wall next to white appliances too. But then ours are more like the Ikea Harlig ones -- square-edged, slightly textured laminate. Perhaps a different finish would make a difference. I agree with you about the Applad soft white; it's a good color. I've got a Lidingo sample door (a dollar or two from the as-is room) and the color is just right in our kitchen. I know Applad is the same finish. The paint I got to test-match (BM Simply White) looks great in here too. One thing is, this kitchen has always had white slab doors. Its original cabinets had plain doors with rounded edges, partial overlay on painted wood frames. Next it got the slab melamine frameless, which as you know is a very different look because of the square edges and no space between the doors and no hinges showing. If I put in Applad everywhere it would look sort of like the old 40's steel cabinets (I think you have said this yourself) -- except that I don't usually think of steel wall cabinets going to the ceiling. Probably not a bad option for this house though.

@fig_insanity Z7a E TN, the fact that those are all mail order nurseries may have something to do with it :-) Because of the number and quality of retail nurseries in this area (and the close proximity to many wholesale growers increasing availability) I almost never use mail order. Really only twice in my gardening lifetime! Both Heronswood and Far Reaches are within a short drive so no need to do mail order there either (yes, Heronswood is no longer a nursery but the garden is thriving and hosts periodic plant sales with many regional vendors). And as I do not really favor any of the yellow leafed forms, I would not go seeking them out. Aztec Pearl offers all the features I look for and it is easily available from local retailers. ps. don't sweat the pedantism :-) It pretty much comes with that territory and most of us just ignore it.

- I water with distilled water which I fill up on at my local co-op. Great - I use Espoma indoor liquid plant fertilizer. The NPK is 2-2-2. I fertilize somewhat liberally by giving them a splash of diluted fertilizer (2x the amount of water instructed) every other time I water (once every 2-3 weeks in the spring and summer and once a month in fall and winter). Let's break this down. The average plant uses about 16% as much P as N and about 62% as much K as N. Fertilizers with a 3:1:2 RATIO supply 14% as much P as N and 56% as much K as N. The reason for P and K being slightly lower than the % the average plant uses is nitrogen is the first and easiest nutrient to be leached from grow media. See the chart below. Nutrient Use: I gave Nitrogen, because it is the largest nutrient component, the value of 100. Other nutrients are listed as a weight percentage or fraction of Nitrogen. To read the chart: P - plants use 13-19 parts of P or an average of about 16 parts for every 100 parts of N, or 6 times more N than P. Plants use about 45-80 parts of K or an average of about 62 parts for every 100 parts of N, or about 3/5 as much K as N, and so on. N 100 P 13-19 (16) 1/6 K 45-80 (62) 3/5 S 6-9 (8) 1/12 Mg 5-15 (10) 1/10 Ca 5-15 (10) 1/10 Fe 0.7 Mn 0.4 B(oron) 0.2 Zn 0.06 Cu 0.03 Cl 0.03 M(olybden) 0.003 A fertilizers RATIO is different than its NPK %s. 20-20-20, 7-7-7, 2-2-2, are all examples of 1:1:1 RATIO fertilizers. Examples of 3:1:2 ratio fertilizers would be 24-8-16, 12-4-8, 9-3-6. 1:1:1 ratio fertilizers supply 43% P and 83% K, almost 3x as much P as your plant can/will use and 1.4X as much K as the plant can/will use, based on the amount of N they will use. This means it's impossible to use 1:1:1 fertilizers so the supply of N is adequate w/o over-supplying both P and K, so 2 things happen. The ratio of nutrients in the soil solution will be unnecessarily high, and the excess of P (in particular), can cause antagonistic deficiencies of 5 other nutrients - calcium, potassium, copper, zinc, and especially iron. To make things worse, your fertilizer doesn't contain calcium, copper, zinc, or iron, or any of the secondary macro nutrients or micronutrients. So there are a lot of red flags insofar as nutritional supplementation goes. - I'm not sure what the original medium the plant was grown in was but it looks like a peat based soil. When I potted up, I used Black Gold by Sun Gro which does not list coir in the ingredients. OK, good. Most growers THINK coir is a direct substitute for peat, but there are several chemical and physical differences that must be addressed to get the most out of coir, and, coir is allelopathic to enough plants you can't take for granted whatever you're growing won't be affected. Sounds like you're ok if the medium you're using holds a favorable ratio of water:air. - When I water, I place their pots in a saucer, I top water until a good amount of water comes out of the bottom and then allow the plants to soak up that water through the drain holes over an hour or two. I'm going to suggest you adjustyour watering habits such that the water that exits the drain hole does not have a pathway by which it can make way back into the pot. The reason we flush the soil is to get rid of excess salts from tapwater (not an issue for you, using distilled water) and to reset the skewed ratio of nutrients that very quickly occurs when using a fertilizer with a ratio that matches up poorly with the ratio at which the plant actually uses the nutrients. So the habit of allowing the plant to reabsorb the fertilizer salts is a contributing to the issues with a skewed fertilizer ratio in the soil solution. Something like this (with a deeper saucer) will work to keep the effluent from getting back into the pot: -I use a moisture meter to determine when it's time to water (along with a general understanding of a plant's tells). The soil column is about 5 inches deep. Moisture meters don't work well because they measure electrical conductivity instead of moisture levels. To validate, clean the probe, pour some distilled water into a clean cup, insert the probe, and note it reads DRY. Then sprinkle a bit of salt in the water and watch the needle move to the WET side. A 5" soil column is about the upper limit when it comes to using the second knuckle moisture test. One of the most reliable methods of measuring moisture levels at the bottom of the pot is by using a wooden tell: Using a 'tell' Over-watering saps vitality and is one of the most common plant assassins, so learning to avoid it is worth the small effort. Plants make and store their own energy source – photosynthate - (sugar/glucose). Functioning roots need energy to drive their metabolic processes, and in order to get it, they use oxygen to burn (oxidize) their food. From this, we can see that terrestrial plants need plenty of air (oxygen) in the soil to drive root function. Many off-the-shelf soils hold too much water and not enough air to support the kind of root health most growers would like to see; and, a healthy root system is a prerequisite to a healthy plant. Watering in small sips in order to avoid over-watering leads to a residual build-up of dissolved solids (salts) in the soil from tapwater and fertilizer solutions - which limits a plant's ability to absorb water – so watering in sips simply moves us to the other horn of a dilemma and creates another problem that requires resolution. Better, would be to simply adopt a soil that drains well enough to allow watering to beyond the saturation point, so we're flushing the soil of accumulating dissolved solids whenever we water; this, w/o the plant being forced to pay a tax in the form of reduced vitality, due to prolong periods of soil saturation. Sometimes, though, that's not a course we can immediately steer, which makes controlling how often we water a very important factor. In many cases, we can judge whether or not a planting needs watering by hefting the pot. This is especially true if the pot is made from light material, like plastic, but doesn't work (as) well when the pot is made from heavier material, like clay, or when the size/weight of the pot precludes grabbing it with one hand to judge its weight and gauge the need for water. Fingers stuck an inch or two into the soil work ok for shallow pots, but not for deep pots. Deep pots might have 3 or more inches of soil that feels totally dry, while the lower several inches of the soil is 100% saturated. Obviously, the lack of oxygen in the root zone situation can wreak havoc with root health and cause the loss of a very notable measure of your plant's potential. Inexpensive watering meters don't even measure moisture levels, they measure electrical conductivity. Clean the tip and insert it into a cup of distilled water and witness the fact it reads 'DRY'. One of the most reliable methods of checking a planting's need for water is using a 'tell' (more reliable than a 'moisture meter'. You can use a bamboo skewer in a pinch, but a wooden dowel rod of about 5/16” (75-85mm) works better. They usually come 48” (120cm) long and can usually be cut in half or in several pieces, depending on how deep your pots are. Sharpen both ends of each tell in a pencil sharpener and slightly blunt the tip so it's about the diameter of the head on a straight pin. Push the wooden tell deep into the soil. Don't worry, it won't harm the root system. If the plant is quite root-bound, you might need to try several places until you find one where you can push it all the way to the pot's bottom. Leave it a few seconds, then withdraw it and inspect the tip for moisture. For most plantings, withhold water until the tell's tip comes out nearly dry. If you see signs of wilting, adjust the interval between waterings so drought stress isn't a recurring issue. *************************************************************** I know the part about the fertilizer is pedantic, but it's important. I urge you to ask questions about anything you want to understand more fully. I use Foliage-Pro 9-3-6 for everything I grow in pots. It's a remarkable product for several reasons, but most importantly, it has ALL nutrients essential to normal growth at a 3:1:2 NPK ratio, and it derives more than 2/3 of its nitrogen from nitrate sources, which helps to keep plants full and compact. Finally, and perhaps most important, getting to a place where your medium allows you to water to beyond the point of saturation, so you're flushing the soil as you water, is the biggest step forward a container gardener can take. When your grow medium is working for you instead of against you, you have control over how much of your plant's genetic potential it will be able to realize. Click me if you have interest in more about media. Al