Once upon a time I wanted to update the kitchen. I liked the layout and everything was really functioning, but I wanted it to look a lot different. I didn't, unfortunately, take many pictures of the kitchen before, but I think you will get the idea. Here is the color of the cabinets before.
This is kind of a partial kitchen shot before hand as well.
We started by getting new countertops. I chose quartz. Why you may ask? (I know you probably aren't asking, but since I am a home project geek I am still going to tell you.) I chose quartz because of its durability like granite however it doesn't require sealing as most natural stones do. It is also highly scratch and heat resistant. Here are the counters installed. They are mostly white with a small speckle in it.
This is the sparkle of the kitchen to me. It is a glass tile backsplash with a metallic silver border tile.
We also added handles to all the cabinetry.
Our Christmas present for the house was a new dishwasher, which I love. It is all white with the buttons hidden on top. It has a child lock for those lovely button pushers that visit my house and it is so quiet. I swear my last dishwasher sounded like a train and the trays were starting to rust out. The new trays are all vinyl and the inside is stainless steel, which hopefully will prevent any rusting. 
We also stripped and restained the cabinets to a kind of lighter cherry color. I think it looks great now, but honestly in the future I would just hire someone to do the cabinets and pay the cost rather than suffer through the process of doing it ourselves to save money. Stain can be rather frustrating to work with and it felt like it took forever to accomplish, so the kitchen was a wreck for quite awhile as was my sanity.
We also got these little burner covers because let's be honest electric burners look terrible, even if you do that little foil trick to cover them up.
Here is a look at the sink area. When the counters were installed we also got an undermount sink. I love this feature when you are cleaning up it is so nice to wipe all the crumbs into the sink instead of them getting stuck in the lip around the sink.
Overall I love how everything turned out and the new little bonuses that make the kitchen look and function just a little better, but wow was this a tough makeover. I might think twice about even cosmetically making over a kitchen in the future.
