Top Tips for Upgrading Your Kitchen

The kitchen is the hub of the house. It’s where mums spend most of their time preparing yummy food and we entertain guests. The value that can be added through a kitchen renovation is quite significant too. It is thought that by upgrading your kitchen, you can increase your property’s value by up to 10% - that’s £25,000 for a £250,000 house. Continue reading for top tips on revamping your kitchen.

How to transform your kitchen into a modern space

For those of you who spend most of their time in the kitchen, when they begin to look a little dated, it’s only natural that you want to bring it back to life with some modern touches. A streamlined, contemporary modern kitchen design, combined with integrated appliances, thoughtful lighting and a mix of levels that helps to keep your room clutter free whilst leaving you more space to relax and entertain might sound like a dream – but it can be a reality.

Home improvements wish list

In a dream world I would win the lottery and be in the fortunate position to buy or build our dream home. Unfortunately we have yet to hit the jackpot and win big.

For the foreseeable future we will remain living where we are. Whilst we love our current home and it has many bonuses there are a few home improvements that I would love to do to make our home better than it is.

Home Improvements

Whilst I often dream about winning the lottery and being able to buy or build from scratch the perfect house for us, the reality is that until the day that my numbers come in (I live in hope) we are stuck with our lot and have to make do with the home that we have.

There are many reasons why I love our house. It is in a great location for us, is a great size, has character with rustic slanted beams in the bedrooms and quaint farmhouse style doors with beautiful latches.

However there are a few things that I don't love about our house. The issues I have with our house are for the most part cosmetic and have not really bothered me too much since we have lived here as I am grateful that we have a roof over our head and the benefits and other lovely things about the house outweigh the bad. Whilst they do not make me hate the house or make daily life difficult, I would love to change a few things about our house.

Kitchen Design Inspiration - key kitchen trends of 2016.

As I consider the kitchen as the hub of the home I like to make sure I decorate and update it when needed to keep it looking its best and being a welcoming place to spend time in. Whilst not the grandest of kitchens our kitchen is the heart of our home; it is where meals are created, cakes are baked with the kids, first tastes are experienced as Jelly Bean weans and where I chat with friends and family over a cup of tea.

Even though we are a little limited on how we can update and decorate our existing kitchen due to renting as we plan on finding our forever home in the near future I am always keeping an eye out for ideas to help me design my dream kitchen. During a recent splurge of browsing the internet and sites such as Pinterest for kitchen design inspiration I came across a post by Better Decorating Bible highlighting the hottest kitchen trends for 2016.

Showcasing Mayfair Granite’s predictions of what kitchen trends will be popular this year the post has given me some fab ideas of how I would like my dream kitchen in our forever home to look like and what key features I would like in it.

Dream kitchen.

I love spending time in the kitchen baking and cooking especially as I have fond memories of watching my Mamgu and Mum bake in our family kitchen when I was a child. Thanks to my childhood spent helping my loved ones bake in the farm house kitchen where everyone gathered for meals and family chats I consider the kitchen as the heart of the home.

Over the years I have lived in many houses where I would spend a lot of my time in the kitchen. Whilst my kitchens have always been adequately practical they have been far from lovely either being tiny, old fashioned or very worn around the ages.

As I often fantasise about having my dream kitchen I was interested to see whether my idea of a dream kitchen is similar or dissimilar to other people’s dream kitchens.

Premier producers of granite worktops in the UK Mayfair Granite recently conducted a survey about dream kitchens. They asked 1,000 UK residents if money was no issue what their dream kitchen would be like, asking them to pick their favourite items and features from 5 key categories – worktops, flooring, lighting, appliances and kitchen style.

Choosing the right fridge freezer.

For a little while now we have been slowly saving up to buy a new fridge freezer to replace our existing one which is unsurprisingly on its last legs having given us 10 years plus of loyal service after being given to me second hand.

Being a family on a tight budget the expense of buying a new fridge freezer is a large expense for us, and as such I want to make sure we buy the best fridge freezer for us and our budget. As there are so many brands and models of fridge freezers available on the market to narrow down our search and help find the right one for us, I have been looking researching what we should consider when buying a fridge freezer.

Fridge Freezer types

As I mentioned there is a huge array of fridge freezers available on the market, with the choice of styles and sizes being a vast one, but when looking at fridge freezer types there are 3 basic types to consider -

Freestanding fridge freezers: can be fitted anywhere in your kitchen/pantry and come in a range of sizes and colours. They are type of fridge freezer that is popular and plentiful on the market and often is the cheapest type of fridge freezer.

American-style fridge freezers: are large with fridge and freezer side-by-side, and as they are large they take up a lot of floor space. Not only are they expensive to buy they can also be expensive to run. Thanks to their large size they hold a huge amount of food and often have lots of extra features.

Integrated fridge freezers: fit behind kitchen cupboard doors rather than being on display. Integrated models tend to have a higher price tag than freestanding models with fewer models available on the market.

Whilst the novelty of an American-style model is appealing due to funds and lack of space they are not an option for us and as we cannot fit an integrated fridge freezer into our kitchen we are planning on getting a freestanding fridge freezer (this type is what we already have) which has the added benefit of being a model that would be easiest to take with us and fit in a new kitchen if we move.

Appliances to make family life a little easier this Christmas.

Family life can be hectic and with Christmas fast approaching the hectic-ness of family life is sure to get even more chaotic and busy than normal. Thankfully family life can be made a little bit easier with the help of useful and practical appliances. Best of all with the festive season looming there are deals and discounts to be had on a huge range of appliances.

Kitchen appliances

Making Christmas dinner for the whole family can be hard work so why not get some new kitchen appliances that will help make the process of cooking up a yummy Christmas extravaganza that little bit easier. If you are cooking the Christmas dinner for the whole family yourself, with a big roast turkey or duck as the centrepiece, investing in a sparkling new oven with lots of oven space and useful technology will help make cooking the Christmas feast a smooth affair. Not only will a new oven be a useful appliance to use over the festive season but it is also a worthwhile investment that will help make family life that little bit easier for years to come.

A new microwave might also be useful especially if the one you already have is old and not working as good as it once did. If you are a cook who likes to prepare in advance, cooking and reheating in bulk especially when catering for a large, extravagant Christmas feast for the whole family a new microwave with the latest technology will be a very useful and practical appliance to make life that little bit easier.