Cue the Jaw's theme music, because the scariest thing that we will probably ever do to this house HAS. BEGUN.

Yea, so... welcome to our kitchen...

Chris and I have been planning this for a while and we KNEW it was coming... Me? I was slightly anxious but mostly nervous about being way overwhelmed, everything costing a fortune, someone accidentally sawing off a thumb, getting tetanus from a rusty nail, finding a dead body in the wall, you know, all the normal things people worry about when starting a big project. Chris? Like a kid on Christmas morning ("I get to sledgehammer stuff today!!!  Yeaaaaaa!!!").

But lets review first... and see the kitchen that we have been with since May of 2011 when we moved in.

view walking in from the hallway

View from the hallway... showing the wall on the left that we are taking down

View walking in from the dining room... this is blank spot right in front is actually where the fridge was

Wall that will eventually hold the fridge and pull out pantry... wall backs up to the guest room

View walking in from the dining room

View from the sink facing the opposite corner

View from the laundry room... again, the fridge has already been moved out

And now we return to Demo Day 2013.

 Like the great friend he is, our buddy Blake came by to help with the demo.
 First step, turning off the water and removing the dishwasher (which will also be replaced with a new stainless steel one)
 Side note to all those curious, make sure you also TURN OFF THE POWER TO THE DISHWASHER before you remove it... (I encourage you all to ask Chris WHY that is important and have him show you his melted metal pair of pliers which almost burnt down the kitchen within the first hour of starting this 3 week remodel... great start, great start)
 Eventually, they got everything turned off and able to set the dishwasher free... (free: aka selling it on Craigslist)
 Hooray hole!!!
 Making double-triple sure everything was off, disconnected, secured, sealed, and tightened, the fun could finally begin.
 And now I give you: "Chris's Favorite Moment of his Entire Life"

 Next up was Blake...
 And then me...
 We then took out the sink...
 Sink and disposal will also be new :-)
 Saying good-bye...
 Psh, whatever, we were never that close...

"I hope you and your disposal drown in the rain!!"

 It was at this point in the project I began to have huge regrets about this whole project and asked the boys to stop.
 HA!!!... Yea right....

A little while later, our other friend Bobby came over to get in on the sledge hammer action
Chris had to make some cuts with the saw to get the last piece of the cabinet out...
 ... and then it was gone...
 Pulling out the rest was pretty easy...

"For the love of God, Samm... put the camera away"

 And this is what we were left with...
 For the uppers, we were going to try and salvage them to use as extra storage in our garage.
 One set came off super easy...
 The other, not so much...
 Getting one set out of two isnt bad...

And now this wall is naked.
 Oh P.S- sorry, did I mention we used a Bagster?
 Totally awesome and WAY cheaper than renting a full dumpster... with everything said and done, it cost us about $150 (bag + pick up) vs. the $350-$400 a regular dumpster costs

Welcome to our home.... dont you just LOVE curb appeal?

Once demo on the main wall was done, the other half of the kitchen was super easy and involved a lot more sledgehammering (seriously, so fun... I recommend everyone trying it)
 We also had to remove a "bit" of drywall since the previous backsplash had been applied with ultra, extra strength super glue (apparently) and couldnt be scraped off without taking chunks of wall with it.

Simple drywall install, patch, and cover with pretty new travertine backsplash and it will be all pretty again

 And so, this is where I am going to leave you with day 1...
 All this was actually done by 2pm and the rest of the day was spent putting a GIGANTIC hole in the wall for our future fridge.  I will be back either tomorrow or Wednesday with all those pictures (spoiler alert: I got to kick in a wall!!!)

So until then, here's a picture of all our manly, demo gentlemen....

From left to right: Blake, Bobby, Chris (mine), Chris's dad, and Chris's uncle

 Can't wait to show you more!!

-Samm