Thanks oldbat2b. I'm thinking of going with Alabama White marble. I still have to take my sample door with me to look at the whole slab but the 8"x8" sample of Alabama white I have has some warm tone creamy veins in it so I actually think it looks better with crystal white than frosty white. Of course, that could change when I see the whole slab. I wish there was a color between the two. Were you able to match crystal white to a SW or other BM standard color? What color did you pick for the trim in your house?

I used Scherr's cabinets in my DIY kitchen remodel, and I was really happy with the quality of the construction, and with how easy they were to assemble (by the end it was taking about 10 minutes to assemble a wall cabinet) Additionally given the adjustable leg-levelers that come with the cabinets, the process of installing the base cabinets so that they were perfectly flat and level was relatively easy for a complete cabinet installation novice to do. Also I cannot speak more highly of the customer service at Scherr's, before the sale in the planning stages, during the cabinet build process as I emailed in some last minute changes and tweaks, and after the the cabinets were finished and shipped. During installation (which was about two months after the cabinets were shipped to me, due to other parts of the remodel taking longer than I planned) I discovered two problems caused by one of my last minute changes, (changing from one brand of drawer slide to another) they changed the drawer slides they included but didn't change the program controlling where the holes were drilled. When I contacted Scherr's about the problem they responded the same day and shipped a fix for the problem to me within about three days. I was also very happy with the final price from Scherr's (about $17000) I ended up with completely custom, shaker style, quarter-sawn red oak cabinets in a custom-colored finish that are both beautiful and functional, for only about twice what it would have cost for the nearest comparable kitchen cabinet setup from Ikea. I cannot compare the cabinets to Conestoga's RTA cabinets, since Conestoga was a complete non-starter for me, given that I was only interested in frameless-style cabinets, whereas Conestoga only seems to offer face-frame style cabinets.

I did ikea in my own kitchen because I really loved the all drawer lowers for a great price. I did conestoga in my mom's kitchen, she wanted a painted and glazed traditional look, and didn't really care about getting lots of drawers, and it also turned out beautifully. My kitchen was more for function (drawers & organizers) and hers was more for the look and custom sizes. I was totally happy with both, for different reasons. Both saved me a pile of money over standard assembled cabinets, though some of the savings was the diy install.

thanks, mathteachr, I thought about doing that....I also considered putting the sink in the island, which would solve this issue. What does GW think about sinks in islands? It would obviously make seating harder. I would probably have to do a second level of countertop for seating, away from the sink, right? We would also have to run plumbing into the island, which I know isn't THAT costly (we're over a crawl space) but we're renovating our whole house so even a grand makes a big difference...