STOP! You haven't lived in this house yet. You don't know if the kitchen layout works for you. Do not invest all this money this quickly. You are setting yourself up for another total gut in 5 years.
Options:
I agree with your contractor that putting an expensive countertop on poor cabinets is not a good idea. So why not replace the countertop with something inexpensive like laminate. Yes, I said laminate. The new colors are lovely and then you can redo the kitchen in 5 years the way you want. Gosh, you could even just tile over the corian for now. I hate tile countertops because my bread dough gets caught in the grout lines but if I looked at it as an interim step I could do it(I think). Also, Ikea butcherblock is inexpensive and very well regarded, and depending on your area stainless steel might not be too bad, you may find a fabricator to wrap the existing Corian countertops with copper or stainless. Lots of options.
If you really want to go down the road of doing everything now, please post a floor plan because you do not want to sink money into a bad layout.
Personal story: In 2001 we decide to rip the back off our house to change the layout of the upstairs creating a master suite. The first floor changed a little tiny bit, in that the dining room got enlarged, french doors to the yard... The contractor said, while we are doing all this and you are living in the basement with your 3 year old and 6 week old we should just re do the kitchen. In my post-partum haze, I said yes, and it was the biggest mistake I ever made. I just redid the existing floorplan. Had I given it thought I would have made major changes. Lucky for me we moved shortly afterwards and the poorly laid out kitchen became someone else's problem. If I still lived there I would be miserable.

Ah...interesting. Great firsthand experience feedback - thanks! I have heard nightmares of people living through kitchen renovations and was really intimidated by that but will think through though with DH and explore that thought! If we do decide to proceed...can you give me an idea of what a posted floorplan would look like on this site? I assume you mean a drawing or upload from a software program?

Completely agree with localeater.
You can live through a kitchen renovation regardless of one child. Replace the counter with something you like that's inexpensive(laminate) do all you research, save your money then proceed.

"but we are coming by our remodel by accident so all our decisions need to be made very quickly." NOT GOOD. Unless you just had a fire/flood there is no reason you can't use the kitchen as is instead of making decisions very quickly.
Whenever I feel that I need to make a decision and can't because it "seems" like it must be made quickly, I sit down on the side of the road like a (smart)donkey. Inertia is a good thing. Whenever I rushed into a purchase(used)cabinets because I wanted it DONE, it didn't work out and I regretted it. This philosophy has saved me from buying a house the past six years and getting stuck with a mortgage. So glad to be a Taurus.

:) Thanks Eatrealfood and localeater. What about the fact that the house is 1926 so living there with reno going on can release toxic dust around child/family for 4-6 weeks? I agree with you and am just trying to figure out how to make waiting work.

Well you could do what people do when they renovate after living there for 20+ years. If they can afford it they move out or stay with a friend, if they can't they work around it(set up a temporary kitchen, seal off the work area,hire a professional cleaner). If you do the renovation during the Spring/Summer you can spend most of your time outdoors in the park with your child. You don't even know yet if you need to/want to move walls/or windows so you have no idea how much dust there will be. If you decide to keep the original layout you won't be knocking down all the ceilings(I had 3 in my kitchen)and walls anyway. You can move out during the worst of the demo if need be.
There is no reason(toxic dust) to rush into a renovation if you have a useable kitchen because you feel under pressure to get it done before you move in.

For the floor plan, you can use software or just draw it on some graph paper and upload it that way. You'll want to add in the other rooms so that the designers can get a feel for traffic.

I agree, putting a lot of money in cosmetic changes without working in the kitchen is likely to backfire. The counters may be ugly, but it is a well functioning surface. I had super ugly laminate (which I painted) until I figure out and can afford remodeling.

Sounds like the only thing that MUST be done in the kitchen is the ventilation for the range.

I can recommend a sink, for when you do remodel. I love my super single Silgranit. They come in 7 colors and a variety of configurations. Easy to clean, feels soft and quiet compared to SS. I have it in metallic gray.

Here is a link that might be useful: Silgranit

Thanks all...deep in thought to go the way of waiting and then I remembered two complications:

1) The venting for the stove which is critically dangerous now (not sure how it has been this way so long!)...why pay to rip out the existing mw and put a vent in that we won't use later? what other complications would there be when we do rip the mw out and do that?
2) In putting in the new bath the city decided they had to come to pre-inspect. In their wisdom they decided our original plan to put the plumbing for the upstairs bath outside the kitchen (going up from the other bath) would not pass inspection and we would pull the plumbing (don't know correct terminology sorry) from the kitchen which entails taking two cabinets that flank the sink down, going into the wall and hopefully getting those back up without damage.

Will discuss with the contractor this morning to see how much $ would go into getting us to have a useable kitchen for the short term so we could wait for all kitchen stuff at once. Very grateful for the feedback so far and agree regarding the dust...we can go away the first week which would probably be the worst time. (There would be one wall moved as we wanted to redirect a closet from the existing kitchen to the hall but will wait on that to do all at once if we decide to wait...that wall is lath/plaster unfortunately. )

You're almost guaranteed to be making at least one huge mistake if you rush into rebuildng/re-sizing cabs, replacing still -finctional appliances, and putting in a good countertop w/o giving serious thought to how you use the kitchen and how to improve any functional deficits it may have for you and your family. Adding the pretty before the functional is almost the same as throwing the money away.

If you have financial constraints, and who doesn't, this advice goes double!

Plus you said this is an older house; the most useful advice always given to new owners of older houses is to stop and live in them for at least 6 months to a year before undertaking any rennovation. You need to learn about the house and how it fits your family before you undertake big changes to an older structure. Because unless you've got tons of money most of the materials, finishes, details are effectively irreplaceable. Once you've reno'd them away, they are gone forever. And old houses have unfamiliar attributes you may not recognize until you've lived in them for some months.

To be candid, unless the existing bathroom fixtures truly don't work, I wouldn't even recommend doing that. The ideas you bring to the house without living there will be vastly improved after you've been there.

The best activity for new owners is to clean, clean, clean - or pay a professional cleaning company to do it for you. And then move in. If you must, paint. But leave it at that for awhile.

You may in the end not care to give months and months of consideration to your kitchen reno plan (but don't underestimate the possibility you'll become TKO - Totally Kitchen Obsessed - it's highly contagious, but not lethal. Sme people just like to get on with it. But at least if you start out by living in the house and make the design decisions after living there for several months you'll know exactly where the iggest problems are and where to invest the major amount of your reno budget to get the most improvement you can. And you won't live to regret any money you spend now for a short term fix, made with long-term materials. That money will still be in your bank accoount when you know for certain what to do. You've nothing to lose and everything to gain by delaying the reno.

HTH,

L.

You can buy a "recirculating" or no vent hood for the time being. Not the greatest filtration but better than nothing and requires no vent changes. Some can be converted to regular exhaust hoods later. But in the case that you desice you want a different hood, or one a different size, you can just resell it on Craig's List, recovering a portion of the cost. A few hundred dollars lost to a temporary, and later replaced, hood that allows you to wait and make considered choices about the kitchen layout would be a great bargain in my my estimation.

I think Pro-Line makes such creatures, but I am sure others do, too.

L.

Echoing liriodendron.
Don't feel compelled to redo the kitchen just because of the micro vent hood issue. Take it down, either put up a recirculating hood only or, dare I say it, have no hood for a while. Your kitchen has probably had terrible ventilation for 80 years, how terrible could a few more months, years of bad venting be. If you need a microwave, get a cheap countertop model. I have two kids and we survive just fine on a 0.7 cf unit that is in the pantry.
Plumbers put pipes in walls all the time, if the wall cabinets get damaged, put up open shelves for a while.
remember we are not saying you will have a lovely perfect kitchen if you don't do the remodel now. You will most definitely have a make do, work around, life is not perfect kitchen. We, or at least I, am saying think long term goal. You can do the remodel now and it will look lovely. It may not function well, and it may not serve your family's long term needs all that well.
Also, the house I ripped the back off of when my kids were babies was a pre-war tudor. So I dealt with all the possible bad stuff issues. It is possible.
Here is an argument you won't here often. It is actually good for your child to see you waiting. Children need to learn to wait for what they want. They need to learn to budget, to save and to plan. They need to learn to make do. And they learn all these things best by example. All through our various renovation projects which we try to do at least partly DIY, my kids say "what are we going to do...." Without a stove- crockpot, microwave, grill, woodstove, cold sandwiches. Without a kitchen sink- wash dishes in the bathroom. Without a shower- shower at the Y. Without hot water- take a cold shower or heat water on the stove. They now know you can do without a lot.

I would be worried your contractor sees money first and your needs second.

I lived in my 1929 house five years before making major changes. First we redid the existing bathroom. Two years later, we did a major remodel. Old homes have lots of surprises, so be prepared to open up your wallet!

Like others have said.....move in and live, then see what you really need.

I agree with the others, but I'm not quite as emphatic, having just finished a large, pressed-for-time renovation. It was hard--very hard--and we lived in the house (with a child) while it was going on, which made it even harder. Being able to still live in another place while you renovate is an advantage.

How long have you lived in Seattle? Have you lived here long enough to fully appreciate how dark and gray it is for so very, very long? I ask because I've seen people move here from other areas and buy houses that they end up hating because there's not enough light. In undertaking a large renovation here (Seattle), I think it's important to be very sure that the house has enough light for you. We ended up adding a couple of windows and some skylights when we did our renovation, and that was as a direct result of having lived here for a while and realizing that there were certain areas of our house where we were desperate for more light. It's hard to know these things without having lived in the house. If you do decided to go ahead, please think carefully about how much natural light you get there. Don't decide based on the light in there over the next few days when it's supposed to be sunnier! In this climate, I really think that fewer uppers and more windows (even with a brick exterior) can help make a kitchen more enjoyable.

I do agree with the others that not having lived in the house makes a rushed renovation even harder. We did ours in a similar kind of rush to what you're planning. However, we had lived here for years first, and we knew what issues we had to fix. We'd talked about incorporating two spaces into the kitchen for years. All that casual talk for years ahead of time helped make our very rushed decisions much easier. I can't imagine trying to make all those decisions without having had the basic ideas already in mind from before.

If you do decide to go ahead, please post your layouts here and let people go over them. There is a huge amount of wisdom here, and that's something you have on your side--you've found GW! Take advantage of the experience and knowledge you'll get here. It's very helpful to people here if you post both your current kitchen layout and a legible floorplan of your entire first floor.

Good luck!

Your two complications aren't all that bad. I haven't had ventilation in my last two houses. My cooktop is in a narrow island, so putting in a hood would be costly. It's also not a safe placement. So, until I have the money and an optimized plan for my budget, effluent settles everywhere and the kids aren't allowed in that area if I'm using the cooktop. I'd rather that than spend thousands for a cosmetic update that doesn't address flow and safety.

It just wouldn't give you bang for your buck.

THANK YOU ALL! Thankfully we had not passed the point of "no return" on the kitchen so stopped everything from going forward on that yesterday.

Your individual and collective wisdom is priceless!

I will be posting pics and layout as we are doing a few interim things before we move in and seeing a few threads which shined light on everyone's love of tudor may want your input on a few things for other parts of the main floor (fireplace and lighting. And then we will post pics/layout for help with the kitchen :) at a pace that we can have fun with. I am very grateful I found GW forums as you all are amazing!

Localeater your comments about helping kids benefit from the waiting etc are all great points.

To our contractors credit he had suggested several times we wait and live there before doing the kitchen.

Windycitylindy: "Being able to still live in another place while you renovate is an advantage." AMEN! This was driving so much of our direction--that and the fact that (including the time it took us to packup and prep our former house for sale) we have been in moving/transition mode for 18 months now and I am soooooo ready to be settled. But don't want to regret any big decisions down the road as we really do love this house and hope to be happy here long term! Thank you also for your Seattle points. Yes...we searched long til we found a house with good light and good outside space to let in light. :)

More later under different threads and thank you all again!!!!

A simple fix for counters while you wait and contemplate layout would be Daich Stone Coat: http://www.daichstore.com/ We did this in our house - took about 2 days (a lot of that is drying time) and it looks great. A cheap fix to hold us over until we can afford to gut the whole thing. I think we paid total $250 for the whole thing including an epoxy top coat for the super shiny finish. We painted over old 90's laminate and a short oak backsplash