firsthouse, thank you so much for your kind words! If you go with the WZ backsplash, you will love it. We have been using our kitchen heavily and it looks just great still. So, here are some pix of the soapstone. The first three are with the counters freshly oiled last Friday. The next few after that are the same counters, after a dinner party for eight, plus our daily cooking and "wear and tear" - taken this morning (Tuesday). It's hard to tell in these photos, but the counters are actually lighter, with most of the oiling residue gone. The counters have gotten naturally darker over the few months we've been using the new kitchen; I would say that they are not as light grey as the sample photo in my post above, but certainly not as dark as when they are oiled. The last couple show you the counters with a wipe of an oiled cloth contrasted with the "day to day" look. Do a search for trailrunner's kitchen; she does not oil her soapstone and you can see how lovely they look (she does a lot of baking, so you can see really nice variations in the counter colour, where she kneads her bread). cawfeegirl, thank you! I have seen your posts and know how exciting it is to be "in process" good luck! Cheers, Eliz

florantha, glad you like it, even if it is white! I do like color and would have done some bright yellow in the backsplash if I could have gotten DH on board, but I also like to change things around, so kept it neutral knowing I can swap out bright accessories to suit my mood. The glass in the cabinets was called "seeded" - lots of random little bubbles. Very subtle and a little old-fashioned. You can see in the cabinets, but it blurs the contents just enough. flwrs - the ROS in the pantry are great - they do make it much easier to find. Even my 10-yr old DS was impressed with the new organization! Hope to see yours soon! jsweenc - it was bound to happen that way! The duct cover came late last week, so here we are. I will say 100% done, although I still need to figure out some drawer organizers for a couple of drawers... (And I can't wait to see yours. You were just waiting on me, huh?)

Thanks rtwilliams! We have a Nebraska furniture mart just a few minutes away so will have to go check it out and look at what they have (bet my husband won't even let me near the place). I still have my heart set on a creamy leather chair to team up with a black table .....maybe something similar to this (although I kind of wanted something with a nailhead trim too) and maybe a nice rug. And...and.... The paint that I used for the doors is Sherwin Williams All Surface Enamel Latex in Satin Black. I had no idea what I was doing, so it is what the salesperson recommended. The first one I painted about 6 weeks ago, so it hasn't gotten too much wear and tear yet, but it seems to be holding up well. I was really worried about how it would clean up, but we actually scraped the popcorn off the ceiling of a room with a black door (anybody who has done this knows how much dust it generates), and it cleaned up beautifully. The true test will be the door to the garage because the dogs will sometimes scratch to go out. Not very vigorously, so we'll see how much it will take.

I LOVE this W/D! they are LG and absolutely ENORMOUS. I cant even reach to the back of the dryer - I have to get tongs to reach wayward socks :-) I was going to buy another LG model but right before delivery, I saw this one that allowed you to move the control panel on the dryer to the bottom and had to have it. I'm only 4'10" (comments please??) and had been worried about reaching the controls. This one is perfect. B4 remodel, w/d used to be in the hall on the other side of the kitchen in a closet but we took that space for the kitchen. The other option we considered was putting it in the garage but our garage is not attached and we don't have water in there so that would have been costly and a hassle on cold mornings :-) I actually love having right there as I just take out the load, set it on the island, fold and then carry to back of the house. The cabinet measures 34 1/2" deep x 36" wide and the doors go into the sides to get completely out of the way. oh and lily1342...you just cant see the stain on mine...they are on the seat where DH sits :-)