“Every generation laughs at the old fashions, but follows religiously the new.” ― Thoreau
So why not just laugh now? – G
“If we do not feel grateful for what we already have, what makes us think we’d be happy with more?” — Unknown
Recently I posted a picture of myself in my kitchen, and I immediately started receiving generous messages from people wanting to help me “update” it. Along with their messages came pictures of how my kitchen could look, if I’d just put some effort and money into it.
I’ve always loved my kitchen, but after seeing those pictures I found myself looking at it through new, critical eyes. Maybe it was all wrong. Maybe the 80’s counters, laminate cabinets, mismatched appliances and clutter really were mistakes I should try to fix. I stood and stared and suddenly my kitchen looked shabby and lazy to me. I wondered if that meant I was shabby and lazy, too. Because our kitchens are nothing if not reflections of us, right? I decided I’d talk to Craig and make some calls about updates.
But as I lay down to sleep, I remembered this passage from Thoreau’s Walden: “I say beware of all enterprises that require new clothes and not a new wearer of the clothes.” Walden reminds me that when I feel lacking- I don’t need new things, I need new eyes with which to see the things I already have. So when I woke up this morning, I walked into my kitchen wearing fresh perspectacles. Here’s what I saw.
You guys. I have a REFRIGERATOR.
This thing MAGICALLY MAKES FOOD COLD. I’m pretty sure in the olden days, frontierswomen had to drink warm Diet Coke. Sweet Jesus. Thank you, precious kitchen.
Inside my refrigerator is FOOD. Healthy food that so many parents would give anything to be able to feed their children. Not me. When this food runs out, I’ll just jump in my car to get more. It’s ludicrous, really. It’s like my family hits the lottery every freaking morning.
THIS CRAZY THING IS A WATER FAUCET. I pull this lever and CLEAN WATER POURS OUT EVERY TIME, DAY OR NIGHT. Mamas everywhere spend their entire day walking miles to and from wells just for a single bucket of this- and I have it right here at my fingertips. I’m almost embarrassed to say that we also have one of these in each of our two bathrooms, and one in the front yard with which to WASH OUR FEET. We use clean drinking water to WASH OUR FEET. Holy bounty.
This is the magical box in which I put uncooked stuff, push some buttons, and then a minute later- pull out cooked stuff. It is like the JETSONS up in here.
This is my medicine cabinet. Since my Lyme is in remission and each of my babies is healthy- there is nothing in here but vitamins and supplements and tea. Thank you, God. This medicine cabinet is a miracle to me. Every time I open it I feel like I should kneel down and kiss the ground. I have an inbox full of letters from mothers whose medicine cabinets look very different.
Speaking of ground- this is our kitchen floor. It’s not fancy, but it’s perfect for our most important kitchen activity: DANCING. When Chase was three a librarian asked a roomful of kids, “what do we do in the kitchen?” Everyone else called out “cook” or “eat!” But Chase yelled “DANCE!”
I can’t even talk about this thing. Actually, let’s take a moment of reverent silence because this machine is the reason all my people are still alive. IT TURNS MAGICAL BEANS INTO A LIFE-SAVING NECTAR OF GODS. EVERY MORNING. ON A TIMER.
And look you guys: LOOK. This is the kitchen corner where I keep all my kids’ school stuff. My kids go to a FREE school with brilliant teachers and a loving administration and they’re SAFE there. The school sends flyers home about PROGRAMS and CLASSES and CLUBS to make my kids’ hearts bigger and softer and their brains sharper and their bodies healthier. This corner reminds me everyday that my kids have at their fingertips what so many around the world are giving their lives for: quality education. When I wear my perspectacles I can’t look at this corner without a heart explosion.
My perspectacled kitchen tour taught me two things this morning: I’m insanely lucky and I’m finally FREE.
In terms of parenting, marriage, home, clothes – I will not be a slave to the Tyranny of Trend any longer. I am almost 40 years old and no catalog is the Boss of Me anymore. I am free. I am not bound to spend my precious days on Earth trying to keep up with the Joneses- because the Joneses are really just a bunch of folks in conference rooms changing “trends” rapidly to create fake monthly emergencies for us. OH NO! NOW IT’S A SUBWAY TILE BACKSPLASH WE NEED! No, thank you. Life offers plenty of REAL emergencies to handle, thank you very much.
I’m a grown up now. I know what looks good on me, and that doesn’t change every three months. I know how I like my house. I like it cute and cozy and a little funky and I like it to feel lived in and worn and I like the things inside of it to work. That’s all. And for me – it’s fine that my house’s interior suggests that I might not spend every waking moment thinking about how it looks.
Sometimes it seems that our entire economy is based on distracting women from their blessings. Producers of STUFF NEED to find 10,000 ways to make women feel less than about our clothes, kitchens, selves so that we will keep buying more. So maybe freeing ourselves just a little from the Tyranny of Trend is a women’s issue – because we certainly aren’t going to get much world changing done if we spend all of our time and money on wardrobe and kitchen changing.
BUT. Listen. I’m nothing if not a tangled, colorful ball of contradictions. I like a good make-over as much as anybody else. So . . . HERE WE HAVE IT. HERE IS THE MELTON KITCHEN MAKEOVER FOR YA! READY FOR THE BIG REVEAL?
Before:
After:
Ba- BAM! Extreme home makeover! My kitchen IS beautiful because it is full of beauty. SO IS YOURS.
Today I shall keep my perspectacles super-glued to my face and feel insanely GRATEFUL instead of LACKING and I will look at my home and my people and my body and say: THANK YOU. THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU. THIS IS ALL MORE THAN GOOD ENOUGH, ALL OF IT. Now. Let us turn our focus onward and outward. There is WORK TO BE DONE and JOY TO BE HAD.
Love,
G
Author of the #1 New York Times Bestseller LOVE WARRIOR — ORDER HERE
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2,233 Comments
I have a huge smile on my face after reading that absolutely DELIGHTFUL piece of wisdom! Thank you for sharing your beautiful heart to help others’ attitudes to become as healthy as yours! I’d give you a hug if I could!
From the bottom of my heart…THANK YOU. After spending nearly 10years in the developing world this is the particular hardest thing for me about “coming home” to the developed west. I am truly grateful to read this very non judgy inspiring post from someone in your shoes. It helps me feel there may actually be a way to bridge the gaps.
THANK YOU!!! I love home decorating but I’m all about taking what you have and making it work and look better. I am really sad at the home improvement shows, catalogs, and stores that want to create dissatisfaction for one reason only: greed. A kitchen is not “dysfunctional” because it doesn’t have granite countertops and stainless steel appliances. A dysfunctional kitchen is one without food and water to cook. I have traveled on mission trips to other countries and I have seen dysfunctional, none of those being made over on HGTV qualify! It also hurts to see perfectly good cabinets, sinks, tables, etc hacked into sawdust when there are other people who need them. Irresponsible! Thanks again, its nice to know that other people have the same perspective!
Wow, this is the first time I’ve read your blog. This is so beautiful! This week has been eye opening for me and I’ve truly been seeing how blessed we are. I love this article!
I love this: Thoreau’s Walden: “I say beware of all enterprises that require new clothes and not a new wearer of the clothes.”
I love this: I’m a grown up now. I know what looks good on me, and that doesn’t change every three months. I know how I like my house.
And I especially love your kitchen ‘make-over;’ my little 1 1/2 year old son and I dance in our kitchen too! Our kitchen is the hub of our home.
Great job! I loved it! And I’m subscribing! Sold!
love this post.. thanks!
Absolutely wonderful, enlightening article! After watching the 5:30 news with the plight of the people in Iraq…. I thank my lucky stars I’m alive, have a home, food, and a messy house! I wish others could see through your ‘perspectacles’ and the beauty of everything that surrounds us!
Ok, There ARE some things I would change. Partially because I cannot imagine rolling out dough with grout lines. And then trying to get dough out of grout lines. And then freaking out about old dough that NEVER CAME OUT of the grout lines. lol But then I bake a lot of bread. A lot of dough rolling goes on at my house. If it doesn’t at yours, I don’t see an issue. So what that it’s not the latest trend? It’s a functional kitchen! It has the appliances, plenty of storage, and a decent amount of counter space. It looks perfect for it’s purpose, the cooking of food, and the storing of an insane amount of kitchen gadgets. 🙂 I’ve lived in plenty of apartments over the years that had fabulous looking kitchens that were not at all conducive to cooking. They looked great, but were a nightmare to cook in.
I have tile counter tops in my kitchen. I just pull out a wooden cutting board and use that to roll out bread. Problem solved (and a whole lot cheaper than replacing counter tops!)
Great post! Gratitude is powerful! Thanks for sharing your healthy perspective with me today! It was refreshing and uplifting!!
I just love you. Really. I do.
I can’t believe anyone would say your kitchen looks outdated! You should see ours! Like you said though, it’s not worth complaining. We are trying to pay off all of our student loans and hopefully be debt free. Remodeling a working kitchen doesn’t get me any closer to my goal.
Funny that this showed up in my FaceBook timeline today. I just called my husband this morning to tell him thank you for making our home so clean and restful for me to enjoy and appreciate on this quiet day with the family out doing their work and school I had my perspectacles firmly attached this morning as well. I feel you in my heart today. We could have been separated at birth 😉
You’re right but there is NOTHING free about the school your kids attend. I pay for it. I have no children and have to write a school tax check every year for WAY MORE than I can afford. Please don’t say it’s free. Instead of saying it’s free, send out a thank you to people like me who have to pay for it or face jail time.
I found your site because a friend linked here from her Facebook page. WOW! I’m so happy to have found this – I have been bouncing back and forth about the same topic, but you have this wonderful way of articulating it. I’m bookmarking this page – a good reminder. I think I’ll just have to buy your book now. Goodness. Thanks.
Jo, did you get to receive the benefit of public education? Just curious.
I am so grateful to live in a country where almost everyone I meet had the benefit of a public education! Businesses can hire better-educated workers, our democracy works better with educated voters, and nearly everyone is educated enough to improve their lives if they want to!
Thank you, USA!
G, this is beautiful. I loved reading it, because it rang true. As our friend St. Anne Lamott would say, Maybe heaven really IS just a new pair of glasses. You have taught me so much about seeing the beauty in my life as it is, and thanks to this post, I’m walking around with the best kind of vision today. xo
This is great!! I wrote something about “being a good grocery store customer” and it touched upon our ceaseless complaints. Complain about not having a specific size of a specific product in stock, about the tomatoes being TOO red, about there not being any grocery carts in the foyer (despite there being dozens strewn about in the parking lot), about the electronic terminals not working (usually some bank error). You name it, people complained about it. How very selfish of us… to ignore the fact that we can go to a store at any time, any place, buy anything we want, fresh water/fruit/vegetables/meat, aisles and aisles of selection, a place to park, carts to carry the groceries, multiple ways to pay, washroom facilities, pay phones, taxi service, emergency procedures, flyers delivered to your door… I am glad you wrote this. I am glad I read it. I am more than glad to pass it on. We need those little reminders that we should be grateful and mindful of those less so. Thank you 🙂
WOW! i am in tears, this hits HOHM in so many ways…. what a beautiful reminder….. i don’t have a family yet but my partner and i share a one and a half bedroom home..with a small garden/farm in the backyard and neighbors yard. we have everything we need and are eternally blessed.. more than we could ever eat.. and in considering moving to something bigger, because all of our stuff doesn’t fit.. i realized having him here and being shown that i have so much more than i use inspired me to get rid of 50% of my STUFF, and stay HERE, because we have all the abundance and health and affordable simple lives full of home grown food and love , i can work for myself doing all that i do, and he can do what he does and do freelance on the side.. and we have it all.. I have enough motivation from leaving the job i thought i needed, and the PAYCHECK, and security of a job, as soon as i closed that door that didn’t serve me.. tons of small jobs independent work came my way and i am SO inspired that i am getting rid of the stuff that i don’t need to fund a trip to africa.. to study more Guinean, and zimbawean music and DANCE….with my teachers..that’s the real STUFF i want and feeds my soul.. all of it.. every cell. i don’t know how i am going to do it but i know i am.. and it all was inspired by realizing that we all are provided for, empowering ourselves to think outside of all the BOXES.. really really is the best thing we can do to liberate our lives.. and P.s. THAT is one of the MOST RADIANT kitchens ive ever seen.. much love.. from boise, idaho.. thanks for INSPIRING MORE LOVE~!
Love your perspective – don’t change it and keep on enjoying all those blessings! Rock on!
Living in Cambodia has forced perspectacles over my eyes. My kitchen is a tiny, terrible gas burner sitting on a bench, and our house is so unfurnished that some wonder if anyone lives there at all. BUT, we have a house, with tiled floors instead of dirt, and with multiple rooms, AND toilets. We are truly winning at life.
Whenever I visit Australia, I am always so overjoyed about the little things like drinkable water coming out of taps, and the ability to flush toilet paper in a toilet, and HOT WATER IN THE SHOWER! The smallest things make me squeal like a child, and make everyone else in the house wonder what kind of slum I am usually living in. I’m not going to lie and say I don’t want the big, beautiful house of my own that I can decorate and make beautiful. I would love that. But I am so grateful for what I have now in my tiny little Cambodia home, and that is all I really need.
Glennon, you absolutely nailed it. Perfect message. Thank you so much for sharing!
Amen! Anyone who took that photo of your kitchen and used it as a prompt for suggestions for how to improve it is just plain rude.
As always, thank you, Glennon. Your voice is one in a million. This one made me cry, and I don’t know why? Relief? Thank you. That’s all I’ve got for right now. 😉
I love your kitchen, in fact, yours has something I would like to have, a French door fridge! However, my fridge works very well, and I am insanely grateful that it does! Thanks for a wonderful blog, I enjoyed it immensely.
Yes, Kathryn, be grateful, because right now I have a french door fridge that does NOT work!
This is a great blog post! I applaud you!
Love this! When we moved into our house 4 years ago, we redid our kitchen. Now I occasionally go onto remodeling sites and see what we did is specifically mentioned as so out of fashion. It makes me laugh. Join me in stepping off the redecorating treadmill–I love your kitchen–both your blessings and just the way it looks in general. So glad you are so blessed.
Gah! Thank you for posting this. We can get so caught up in the crap of comparison. Thank you!
This is the best blog post I have ever written!! Thank you so much for writing it, and to the friend who shared it on facebook so I could read it. I will be sharing!!
Oops .. not written, read! *L* I am so excited about your post that I totally forgot how to type the words in my head!
This is the best post you have ever written. The END
Right on!
I love this so much. In a world where our houses are crammed full with mostly junk, yet there is still so much depression, unkindness and untolerance. We seem top be filling our lives with a lot of the wrong things. I just heard a quote recently which I love. “Enough is more than a feast”.
What a great antidote to Pinterest! Thank you for reminding me to wear my perspectacles more often 🙂
You are one smart mama and your family will forever be blessed by your wisdom. That last picture should be enlarged, framed, and hung in a very prominent place in your kitchen. Just beautiful.
I so needed to hear this! I was just sitting here thrilling how I wish my home could be a new and beautiful as all my family and friends and wishing I had the money that they have to fix it all up to perfection. Feeling jealous and small. Thanks for the reminders of how blessed I truly am!
Thank you SO much for this. Exactly what I needed to read today. I’d love to follow you on FB. I’d love to be your neighbor, sister, staff, kid…anything that would give me frequent access to so much intelligence, wit and wisdom. Please keep writing. And I do agree that your kitchen is beautiful!
THAK YOU SO MUCH!! As a working Mom (outside of the house) I want to spend my time with my child, not “perfecting” the environment they inhabit….
Glennon, You are the bomb!
My kitchen is from 1970, it is gross,yet I too am grateful. Sometimes though, I do dream…
Just because it’s from the 1970’s, that doesn’t qualify it as gross. It may not be your style. But that’s a matter of personal taste. Unless you are admitting that you keep a dirty house, I suggest you refrain from using the word gross to describe it.
“What other people think about us (or our kitchens) is none of our business.” I don’t remember who said this but I try to live by this in my dancing house that has had no renos in 20 yrs because I’ve been busy raising my boys. People have no business doling out judgement on others. Live, and let live.
You kitchen is just beautiful… thank you for helping me see that my kitchen is also beautiful. I could use a segment on master bathrooms… I’m not sure you can change my mind on that one 😉
Outstanding,so many folks just are not satisfied with anything,on to the next.I myself am grateful for what I have too.Its not fancy or ‘up to date’ but its paid for AndI cook pretty good food in their too…LOL…Kudos to you…
I love this. I was just driving home from school wondering if I should gel stain our bedroom furniture…
Also, thank you too–I’m a teacher, and I was having a hard time getting my room setting up mojo flowing today. Your perspectacles will be borrowed and worn when I go back tomorrow. Thank you for expressing your gratitude for education. Public school teachers get beat up quite a bit, you have bandaged my wounds.
Yes. We live in an old house, and it’s funny when a contractor was trying to “fix” stuff. It’s 110 years old, the floor boards are uneven, they creak, the floor slopes. Perfection is boring. I hate we live in this disposable world. If it isn’t pretty and perfect, throw it into a landfill and pretend we’re not killing our planet. Great read!
Wonderful article and reminder!!!!
Absolutely beautiful post. Thank you.
Great post, just one quibble – your kid’s education is not free. So be sure to give yourself and all fellow taxpayers a big thank you for chipping in for public school, libraries, police and fire protection.
Love this and such a good reminder! Thank you! I totally agree the kitchen is the best place for dancing and the coffee pot deserves that moment of silence! <3 J
I super-duper covet your “Carpe kairos” dealie. I’m off to Pinterest figure out how to make some nifty subway art of it or something.
(tongue in cheek, of course, but I just may paint one for myself next time I’m feeling crafty)
I have a cracked driveway. I recently told my neighbor that I was thinking of having it repaved. My neighbor is a well respected, very successful designer. Her response was ” I think that it is charming, as it is.” This gave me pause. She is a top designer, with all sorts of awards, after all. Her remark gave me an entirely new perspective. I will live with the cracked driveway, for awhile, at least.
Well put! How can we be better examples to our children who “want” everything? Even though they have stuff, they ask for new toys, new clothes, new possessions. Monkee see, Monkee do. They learn it all from us.
Well said. Always look at your own plate and be happy for what you have.
YES. Just YES. thank you for this. (PS I love the story about Chase yelling out “dance” – that is SO GOOD). xox
I *like* your kitchen.
Seriously.
I always complained about the kitchen in our old rental. Because it had super old, sticky cabinets.
We just bought a house that sat empty for the better part of a decade. There was so much mouse pee glued to the white formica counters that they’re permanently stained yellow *shudders.* I can’t wait to be rid of them.
It is not possible to create enough Thumbs Up or Likes to this post. Yes! Yes! A thousand-times YES!
You just made me cry like crazy!!!! Thank you for this, you know what? You have the best kitchen in the world!!!
I need to read this every single day. I’ve found that just NOT GOING into stores and NOT OPENING catalogs is the best thing to keep me from WANTING. I don’t even know I want something til I see it in the store. That’s ridiculous. What is wrong with me? Why am I so susceptible to marketing? I hate that about myself. I need to keep the perspectacles GLUED ON at all times. I have also found if I find myself wanting to buy something for the house to imagine that article in the “Donate” pile in four years. Because it will be there. That seems to keep me from buying stuff. And then I imagine how nice the stuff I already have would look if I would just go home and CLEAN something rather than shop. But then I go home and read Momastery and sit down and don’t clean. But that’s okay, man. Its great, actually….Thank you!
Awesome post!
I so identify with your Wonderful Post! Awesome! I do believe you have a Beautiful Kitchen and a spectacular Family to have it Serve well for!! I Cannot even Begin to tell you how TRUE your statements are for me as well!! I actually have a little ritual of “Gratitude Giving” each night as I check the locks, make sure the smoke alarm (I have to cover it with a bag to cook in oven!) is uncovered and then bask in the glow of my pretty nightlights! My home is not even close to anything going into any magazine, but, it is the WORLD to ME! And yes, I have LIVED MUCH, M U C H Worse, so, I do know what I have!
What a great post. I obviously need some perspectacles!!
I love it, I love it, I love it! As someone who also gets caught up in the “the grass is greener and the kitchens are shinier” syndrome, I thank you for this perspective shifter and reminder that life is good just as it is today. Thank you!
Just what I needed to read today! You have no idea how much I appreciate this message and am grateful for the messenger. Thanks!
As a parent of a now adult with special needs, I spent years trying to overcome being a “less than”…so funny that you used the very words that I used almost seventeen years ago to describe my state and how others were always trying to make my family feel, in an article that I had written for my church newsletter.
What I have learned since then, having given up most of the “regular stuff” that most families take for granted, is exactly what you have described here. It’s just stuff. A home can only be made with love. And as long as it is a safe haven for those who reside there, you really don’t need all of the bells and whistles….
I think your kitchen is awesome just the way it is — and it’s huge! I live on the West Coast, so we usually have to make do with tiny kitchens in tiny apartments/houses. A lot of times, people upgrade because they are bored, or because things are stained and one good paint job could have fixed it.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for putting into words what I hope we all work to feel every day!!! Wonderful!
WONDERFUL! Love every word of this. May I link to it in a Lesson of Hope? Especially love the word, “perspectacled.” You are very wise and your family is beautiful.
What a blessed perspective! I recently had similar sentiments while in the middle of a LONG kitchen remodel process and was washing dishes in the bathroom and letting them dry in the shower… AGAIN. God urged me to be thankful like you that I at least had clean running water! Oh so much to be thankful for and yet so often we are not!
Brilliant! Absolutely brilliant! Our neighbors just did an entire revamp of their downstairs. It looks incredible, fresh, stylish and new. Am I a little envious – yes. Do I appreciate the fact that my kitchen is where my kiddos help me make good stuff to eat? Absolutely. Do I love that my living room is where my son creates his new masterpieces every night or where my daughters show me the latest dance moves? You betcha! So I have tried (and been somewhat successful so far) to live by the motto “What I love best about my home are the people I share it with”. Thanks so much for sharing your home with us!
You’ve got an attitude of gratitude! And it will save you a lot of money, too!
What a wonderful post! Everything you said is absolutely true, and stated perfectly! Love it!
This post is without a doubt my favorite post EVER… Love the perspective. Love the gratitude. Great reminders.
This is really good. I went out to dinner with my husband Saturday night. The food was delicious and the atmosphere was magical, but I did not enjoy it as much as I ordinarily would have. I kept thinking about the Christian children who are being beheaded on the other side of the globe. Part of me wondered how I will be able to enjoy anything while they are suffering so. Another part told me to enjoy my blessings while they last because that could be me someday. Sunday morning I wondered why there was no mention of our suffering brothers and sisters in church. No urgent call to prayer. If it were me and my children, I would want Christians around the world calling out to God, urgently, constantly, fervently. We are so blessed. Thank you for the perspectacles.
Reluctant Baptist, you and I are two of a kind! Your words touched my heart, as did this blog post we are both commenting on!
: )
VERY WELL SAID!!!!
My father-in-law once said to my hubby and I that the key to financial happiness and freedom is to want less stuff. I remind myself of that literally every day. Thanks for doing it for me with this post! 🙂
I’m glad the my kitchen isn’t the only one on earth full of people and papers 🙂 I’m just impressed that your counter is visible in some spots!!!
And seriously, the magic that makes my Coke cold is like, seriously, the best magic of all time.
Beautiful. Thank you thank you for being bold and honest. I love this.
This is a great reminder to all. I love how you blend truth and humor, but it really hits home. I would love for you to post this as a guest on my blog!
AMEN, and amen, and amen again!
Love this, your kitchen is beautiful!
You’re kitchen lots great to me. You should see ours!
I like your kitchen. And thanks for the reminder. I have lived in my house for 11 years and one of my neighbors is remodeling her kitchen for the 2nd time in 10 years.
Sharing this immediately with my husband. He is always the one saying I wish we had this or I wish we had that. I am always telling him, “look what we do have, we are lucky”! I absolutely loved this post! Thank You!
All I can say, is thank you. I don’t even know you, but I love you!!! LOL. There are times I look around my house, and I get depressed thinking this needs to be done, I don’t have this, etc. Now, I will look at it and feel blessed….especially with my coffee machine 😉
Beautiful G!
Your kitchen has all the good stuff- a loving family! What more could any kitchen possibly need?:)
Loving your perspecticals! I think I’ll wear some too if that’s ok:)
when I met the love of my life, his kitchen had ALL the labels facing forward-yes, just like the grocery store (vitamins and health aids too). I discovered I HAD to do it that way because it was RIGHT. still doing it 20 years later (and he is now deceased).
Um, your appliances match, nothing looks (obviously) broken, why exactly did people say you need to remodel? A kitchen remodel, to me, is to improve the functionality of the space. A backsplash to prevent mold from growing. Extra cabinets or counter space. Changing the layout to include a dishwasher. If your kitchen is functional and YOU love it? No one else’s opinion matters.
I love, love, love your kitchen. It is full of the best stuff… Love. And a person who can see the important stuff in life. Thank for you all you share!
Thanks for this. I need to use my perspectacles more often!
Smiling all over. I love this. As someone who loves to read decorating blogs, this is just what I needed.
I don’t know who thinks your kitchen needs a make over other than someone who’d like to have some of your money in their pockets. It looks great to me.
This post……Amen. And Amen. And Amen! Having a Keeping up with the Joneses mentality is a recipe for disaster! It saps you of all your strength and contentment, and you get no further along in the end, because that need to update or fix or acquire will always be replaced by something else. Thank you for making me realize how freaking much I have just owning my own house and land and having food in my fridge and clean water coming out of my faucet! Perspectacles is right!!!
You have the most beautiful kitchen to me because it has evidence that you have children. Always be thankful of those precious moments you find fingerprints on the fridge or artwork clutter on the counter because there are a lot of mamas out there that would love to see those one more time. Your post was wonderful.
You are wise beyond your years – your family is blessed.
So awesome! This is a fresh perspective and one that many of us need to remember! Thanks so much for opening eyes!!
Wow, such amazing perspective. I so needed to read this and redirect my thinking… we moved to a smaller apartment just a month ago. I moved from the largest kitchen I’ve had (except for the pantry – I once had a humongous pantry with a smallish kitchen – I liked that A LOT) to a teeny-tiny little galley kitchen with a fraction of the cupboards and counter-space. Then, too, is the living room which needs to fit our usual living room stuff (books, TV, seating, etc) and now needs to fit my craft supplies since we lost our third bedroom… I feel overwhelmed over making this work. BUT, yes, we have running water and a fridge and even a chest freezer full of food and air-conditioning (so necessary in August in Texas) and toilets… First world problems, as they say. 🙂
Love this. Actually needed it right now. My builder grade cabinets hold what they need. My water is finally cleared to drink again. We’ve been on a book order this last week. We are happy and healthy. And that is enough.
Bravo! Bravo! That was a really awesome read! My kitchen was new in 1989…It has never been remodeled. I have watched family, after family that I know, remodel their kitchens following trends for “resale value.” None of them have listed their homes for sale. All of them have kitchens that look alike to me. Pretty enough…but, like the author of this piece, I LOVE my kitchen best. It is one of the happiest places to be in my home! For all the same reasons!
The after picture is perfect! What a difference it makes! 😀
Word! So good…thank you oxo
Brilliant!
Your guys are so gorgeous. What a wondeful post.
Well said! Well said! Way to keep it real.
Your kitchen is my kitchen! Same floors, same fridge, same microwave, same clutter. I love my kitchen!
This was so wise. I love this. Sometimes, I watch the home reno shows and I forget what I already have. Many Thanks!