When Christina and her husband first looked at the Philadelphia house that would eventually become their home, they almost didn’t buy it because of the kitchen: “It was so small, so brown, and so ugly,” Christina writes on her blog Christina’s Adventures. But they did, after deciding they were going to figure out a way to open, brighten, and maximize every bit of space in the kitchen — and on a tiny, $3,500 budget. And that’s exactly what they did!