Kitchen Conundrum

Our kitchen is stuck in the year 1968 or somewhere very near there.  Actually, that's not quite true.  A number of months ago, my dear husband started to pull down wall paper and now a third our kitchen is in that "undone" state.  The stuck part has dark brown cabinets, a brown push-button electric stove, and centennial wallpaper.

Anyhow I hate my kitchen and I should have held out for a better one when we were house hunting.  I was tricked by the amount of space, but in truth only half the kitchen is actually workspace.  The rest is eating space.  I didn't recognize that.  And the amount of workspace is laughable.  How on earth did the family before us live and raise children with this kitchen?

Here are the major problems, aside from outdated appliances and decor:

• No pantry!!
• Terrible lighting
• Poor storage
• Horrible work flow/design
• Traffic pattern bisects the kitchen

We will finally be talking to someone about redoing our kitchen. We chose them because on their website they say they will work with DYI people. They have a culinary center and a can take care of design as well as the whole renovation and contractor process. I asked around and they've got a solid reputation, so I'm nervously optimistic that our kitchen conundrum will begin to be solved with these people.