Homemaker Monday: To Design a Kitchen - Part Three

Welcome to...

Thank you for joining us! If you're new to this carnival and would like to enter your post, please check HERE for the rules and regs.This post is still under construction, but feel free to enter YOUR post into Mr. Linky. Thank you for being here!

YOURS: Today's "YOURS" go to Kendra over at "My Insanity" . This girl is amazing and inspiring! Her post featured the hand-made Christmas gifts she gave her kids last year. She made adorable hooded animal towels. Now these aren't just any hooded towels. We've all seen 'em, right? You just get a wash cloth, fold it, sew it on and you're done. Nope. Not Kendra. She goes all out. Take a look at one of my favorites she did for her daughter...


Isn't it just gorgeous?

For Kendra's entire hooded towel post, click HERE. Thanks for the holiday inspiration, Kendra. I know you'll have all kinds of other awesome ideas as this special season draws near. We'll be watching!

MINE: The Cooking Center- Let me tell you a story that begins with coveting. It was a 60" Wolf brand two-oven, 6-burner, 24" griddle range I coveted and I NEEDED to have one for my kitchen...


(Click photo for source.)

After all, all of the cool kitchens in the magazines have them, so my dream kitchen was going to have one, too. Then I looked at the price. The CHEAPEST I could find was over $10,000 for the range and $9,000 for the hood...


(Click photo for source.)

As much as I wanted a WOLF, I simply could not justify paying over $19,000 for a range. However, I did want a 60" that could meet the needs of our family, so I started shopping for other options. Then I saw her. She was a little beauty for only $5000, including tax and shipping and I KNEW I was getting a great deal! She didn't come with a hood, but I would design my own and have it manufactured here in Mexico for cheap. Here she is...


(Click photo for source.)

We ordered her, had her shipped, paid a 17% duty to get her across the border, put her up on a crate out of the weather for storage and waited for our home to go up. Then it happened. I came across an article in a kitchen design magazine warning about the use of commercial ranges in home kitchens. I knew mine was a commercial range (that was the huge attraction!) so I felt like I had to do further research to find out what the problem could be. It turns out that these commercial stoves get much hotter on the outside than do regular home ranges. I had to know how hot, though, so I called the company and asked. They told me that they could get up to 170 degrees on the outside. Okay, so how hot was that? Could I live with it? I googled it and learned that one can receive a second degree burn in two seconds by touching a 170 degree surface. That did it. I couldn't have something like this in my kitchen with all these little kids running around. I humbly went to John with the appropriate information and told him that I thought we'd made a huge mistake in trying to scimp on our range. We had already paid $700 for shipping and nearly a thousand dollars in duty, so instead of shipping it back for another $700 and trying to get our money back, he suggested we keep it and use it for our future outdoor kitchen. After careful consideration, we chose this option and decided to simply buy two 30" ranges and put them side by side in place of the original 60" range. We chose some stainless steel Kenmores with convection heat and warming drawers on the bottom and were pleased with the price: $2.400 for both of them combined. For the hood, our contractor simply welded metal pieces together in the appropriate formation and tiled them with spanish tile, which worked better than a stainless steel hood in our Mexican-style kitchen, anyway. Yes, it was a costly mistake, but it worked out in the end.

Here are the final plans I gave to the carpenter and the general contractor who would make the hood...


Here are the current results...


(The above super-clean cooking center is brought to you by this girl...)


(Thanks for doing such a great job with your Saturday chores, Kyla!)

And here is what I plan on adding just as soon as we find the box in our basement which contains the IKEA utensil bars. You've gotta love IKEA!


Wish me luck on finding the box!

OURS: Okay, now let's see what you've got for us today. Remember to feel free to search your archives for old posts or go ahead and create a new one for today. Also, if you have anything holiday-y, I would love to see that, too. If you would like to enter multiple posts, don't be shy. The more ideas, the merrier, especially at this time of year. Thanks again for stopping by and I hope you become inspired!



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