Voila!

The top picture is looking into the kitchen from the family room. The red cooler at the far end is my "counter" where I usually cook pancakes on the griddle. The griddle hardly ever slips off. The garbage can in the back right corner is useful as a counter, and with the slanted lid, the paper plates we use fall right to the dog's feet. The black part if the wall is where we have taken out the drywall and the new window will go right there.

Morrie is expanding the kitchen floor into the family room (which is one step lower so we have to raise the floor). Do you like our plastic "walls"? They are super handy and the dog never gets stuck in them...

Maria is handy as a weight when Morrie needs the floor framing held down. Isn't she cute? She only tripped on it once today, and then right afterwards went in the kitchen and tripped over stuff in there. You are not allowed to have bare feet anymore in here. Although, I try to do a really good clean up job so the cats and dog are safe.