Well, what on earth is going on? I updated my browser and the post is still showing on my computer. This is bizarre! I'll try pasting my post again so that you can see it. Thanks for commenting Rhome! I miss seeing your posts around here, although I'm not spending as much time in Kitchens these days, either. I appreciate all the help you generously gave when we were in the planning stages. We ended up setting up a sewing area under the south windows of the master bedroom in the farmhouse. I banished the grain bins and grinder to the basement, lol! It was a pain in the romper, but it worked for the time we were there. When life got crazy with moving and renoing the new house, we switched to store bought baked goods--blech! We are just now starting to bake all of our goodies again. Keep your eyes pealed for the new kitchen reveal maybe in late winter or perhaps spring. It's very livable at the moment, but not ready for a full reveal. We still need to make the island, the hutch, paint the wall oven cabinet, and tile the bs. This is what the new place looked like when we moved in: Makin' Do and Gettin' Through Here's where the kitchen is at a standstill: Midpoint, good enough for now... But the playroom/breakfast room just off the kitchen is now a library: "Bookworms welcome"

I love the casual comfort of your space, recognizing all the planning it took to achieve that feel! The wainscotting, soapstone, and hex tile floor make that happen for me, as do all the personal touches like the picture shelves and your lovely barnyard art. I love the thoughtful touches like the med cab placement, the shower' s window, and the foot-rest shelf in the shower - which I may be stealing! And saving the chute, even though that meant re-routing it, is just another example of the care and you took to get it right. I have a possible solution to the hand towel dilemma. Remember how farm kitchens often have those three-fingered towel holders under the sink to hold kitchen towels as they dry? The ones where the three rods come out from a center hinge and can be rotated into any position from all lined up together when not in use to spread far apart so that towels on them can dry? Ginger makes them now in two-rod style in nice finishes for the bath. 16" long. It would really match your farmhouse feel. Where to place it is your problem, you are thinking. I say, put it on the wall just in front of the vanity. You often step away from a sink when done, so the towel will be handy. Rings bunch up the towel and it takes longer to dry. Either this Ginger 0322-16 or any straight towel bar in a 12" or 16" size works, height-wise. Because I am on my Kindle and lost an entire post yesterday by touching somewhere on the screen on accident, I am going to post now, then try to link to the Ginger bar in another post. PS: I love the the violet wall color!

Our friends had a great KD who took their kitchen from blah to absolutely beautiful and kept their stained cabinets on the perimeter. Their perimeter cabinets also have the cathedral arch and you don't even notice that now. Their L-shaped layout is exactly like yours except that their frig is to the right of their range and they had a kitchen desk where your frig wall is. They kept their hardwood floor. Here's a few things that their KD did. Changed out the double stainless sink for a white short-apron Kohler Whitehaven / Added an ORB touch faucet / Added white subway tile backsplash/ Removed the stained island, enlarged it substantially with painted gray cabinets and added a Sharp MW drawer and trash in the island / Added large dark lantern pendants over the island /Removed laminate countertops and added marble look quartz / They had an electric stove with the MW above and changed it to a stainless gas range with a stainless slant hood /Added stainless frig/ Kitchen desk was converted to a coffee and beverage bar / Removed panels in the upper cabinets that had been above the desk to lighted glass mullions / Removed desk and added beverage and wine cooler. I see that you also have additional wall space on your sink wall as they did. The KD had a cabinet maker match the stain and added an extra base cabinet there. Their trash had resided there previously. My neighbor also had a similar situation with 30" wall cabinets. Her KD added stacked cabinets above to the ceiling. Huge beautiful change.

Anything with lots of nooks and crannies and wide grout lines will be hard to clean, whatever it's coated in. BUT - that depends on how you cook. For my mother, who does lots of things in the oven and is the maven of steam and boil - not an issue. For my husband, who is always pan frying, searing, sauteing, etc... it would require a power sprayer. I won't have beadboard anywhere near a kitchen he cooks in, either. I have nothing against beadboard - I actually like it and it's cottage feel. But I've been around the block with HIM enough to know that I'll never keep the grooves clean. (Tomato sauce that gets slopped down the side of the cabinet... and into the grooves. Been there!) So, when you get opinions, see if they jive with your lifestyle, too. A lot of the kitchens we saw in upper level houses at the local parade of homes last weekend are clearly for show and have no relationship to a working room. Think about the way YOU cook and they way YOU live when you pick both your finishes and your layout. Not just IF you cook, but HOW you cook. The hubs was incensed at one kitchen that had the double wall oven around a corner from the range. Because he likes to sear things on the stove and finish them in the oven. For people who never do such a thing, that might not be a problem. For him - huge safety issue. If you don't like subway tiles, give some thought to arabesque tiles. Or maybe a pretty porcelain? It think the reaction you got has more to do with things not meaning the same thing to different people. Pinterest-based trend words aren't really accurate style descriptors. I find it frustrating, too, from the other side of the coin. When I search for "farmhouse" I don't mean JoAnna Gaines-esque, I mean actual farmhouse. But that's not what I get.