Jenswrens, I think I just replied to your post at Kitchens about maple versus cherry cabinets. Well, come to my house for the kitchen tour and see my cherry cabinets first hand!! The Twin Cities Bungalow Club holds a home tour every year. It features kitchens this year, so you are in luck!! The tour is Saturday May 14th from 10 am to 5 pm. There are 6 homes on the tour, four in Mpls and two in St. Paul (including mine). Start the tour at 4356 41st Ave. S. in Minneapolis (corner of 41st Ave. S. and 44 Street E.) where you will get a map and description to all the other houses. For more info, you can visit the TCBC website at www.bungalowclub.org. It is a very active club with great events.

Hi Lady_West, I frequent other forums normally, but I noticed your post when signing onto gardenweb today. I wanted to tell you that I love your bungalow and, fwiw, add some suggestions/thoughts on choosing dining tables and chairs :-) Of the choices, I like the table in #4 best. It looks like Tell City furniture to me. My Mom has Tell City in a little different style and she always says the wood is called "hard rock" maple. It has mellowed to rich brown tones and I guess it just looks like home to me :-) Also, about the table in choice #4, the long sides look like they are drop leaf. The bench could go along the side with 2 chairs on the other side and one at each end. That is probably the length it will be, I doubt it has leafs. You will want to measure your dining space to be confident of the max size of extended table that will fit in your dining room. Consider getting around with the chairs in place as well as if there is room for a hutch buffet, if that is included. With a "real" wood dining table, the top is not Formica and will stain and ring (over time) from drink glasses and spills that are not immediately wiped up. Heated dishes can mar the finish as well. That is why most ladies of the "dining room" era would have used table pads under the table cloth, to protect the table surface. For daily use, a Formica top table, while not as pretty, is more scratch resistant, durable and practical for young active families. When viewing the chairs in person, test them for joint strength. Put one hand on the back and the other on the seat, using downward pressure wiggle the chair. You can tell very quickly if they are sturdy or worn out. Also, sit in them and if the back "gives" or makes a pop or crack noise, beware. Long tables, like the one in choice #5, tend to sag in the middle without support. Vintage 5 leg kitchen tables had the support for extra length. A 5 leg kitchen table is another style you might consider in your new home. Also, if the leaves of the table are stored in a closet or under a bed, they can become a different color hue from the unprotected everyday used table. Be sure to examine it all together in daylight, so you can see more clearly what you are getting. You might consider waiting to buy wood dining furniture set until you uncover and refinish your wood floors. If the wood furniture matches the floor too closely, they blend in and their beauty is lost. Congrats on beginning a new chapter in your life. Take your time, purchase what you love and it will feel comfortable and look like your home. Have fun, Deb

Hi Francy! I have had no problems with that shade and light...the only thing that bothers me about it is that I screwed up the calculations and it is not centered between the hood and the walll.. :(. My ceilings are 8 feet and I also have the open shade above the sink and honestly I never really look up at them to catch any glare. My rationale too was not to have too many different shades/styles. You can see that the fitter and canopy on my sink pendant match the small stove light. All my light shades have the black stripe but they did not offer the stripe on the one over the sink. Good luck and I would love to see pictures of your finished period kitchen! Tina

Ha, Becky...you are not wrong. At this point I think that I’d rather have multiple root canals while touring colleges than ever, EVER do another kitchen renovation. I should have known from reading the posts here that it wouldn’t be smooth sailing, but I’ve been surprised by how much I’ve disliked the process. Mostly due to our own poor planning but also some unforeseen complications, we’ve had to have the plumber and electrician out countless times over the past week. The appliances were installed today, but because of the position of the gas line, the slide in range sticks out an inch beyond what is called for/looks reasonable. The only solution would be to have our cabinet installer come back out to re-set the two small base cabinets on either side of the range, but he is booked out til infinity and I can’t even imagine how bummed our cabinet designer is going to be when we reach out with this request (she’s gone so far above and beyond for us on this project that I feel dreadful even asking). We obviously can’t have the counters templated until we deal with this situation, so we’ll have plywood counters for eternity. My husband decided that they needed to be more water resistant so he bought fake marble contact paper to add to the plywood and at least that is making me LOL. I’m just kind of down in the dumps and questioning my choices again (this time appliances). I have to head out of town on Thursday for work and honestly I think that it will be good for me to have a bit of space from this. I intend to take some stellar naps when I’m not at the conference.