Kitchen

The house I recently bought, and am waiting to close on, came without a kitchen. No appliances, no cabinets, no sink - just walls, windows, a water pipe and a gas pipe. I knew that there was no kitchen when I put a bid on the house, so I knew what I was in for. Here is the kitchen in all it's stuff-less glory:

Over the course of the past two weeks I have spent a total of almost 9 hours at two different kitchen planning places. One was a large, national DIY home improvement store (not the orange one...), and the other one was a specialized, local kitchen and bathroom place. I enjoyed the service at both places. The atmosphere was admittedly a little more ritzy at the small local place, whereas the prices were better at the large chain.

I could launch into a tirade on buying local and supporting the local economy, but the bottom line is: I only have so much money to spend on a kitchen. Sure, it would be nice to spend the money someplace other than a national chain, but it looks like I just can't afford it. Plus, no cabinets are made locally, so wherever I spend my money, the bulk of it will go someplace entirely unlocal anyways.

Wherever I end up buying the kitchen, I have to order it next week, since delivery takes four weeks and I'm moving out of my apartment at the end of May. Any advice on kitchen-buying would be appreciated.