What if we just took the paneling down?

Awhile back I posted some photos of what our kitchen looked like when we bought our house eight years ago.

It was sold "as is" so this is actually what it looked like when we moved in.

We had no intention of doing anything but painting the paneling and cabinets and doing something about the floor. But the countertop (what little there was) and tile backsplash had a little bit of a retro feel that we could live with.

Fast forward to the remodeling we did on the rest of our house. We had removed paneling from a bedroom and that went pretty well, so my husband thought he would do the same in the kitchen. Yeah....that didn't go so well. So as we stood there staring at the exposed lathe and chunks of plaster falling off, we went over our options. Spend a bunch of money fixing the damage we'd done. Or spend a little bit more and get a new kitchen.

So here's what we ended up with.

Five years later, we are trying to sell our house and I'm glad we re-did the kitchen since now I know what I will want and not want when we do the kitchen in our new house.