Is it an open concept living room/kitchen? If so, I would replace the flooring in both the kitchen and living room to match. If that's not in the budget right now, one thing you can do is to scrape out the top layer of grout (they have a tool to do this at Home Depot) and then you can apply a darker grout on top of it. I did this in a shower once and it worked great. There are some carpeted mats you can get in the kitchen that have foam in them and they help tremendously, so you could try those and see if they help. Then when you are ready to replace the living room carpet, you could replace the kitchen to match as well, giving a more consistent look.

Epoxy grout colorant is your friend until you can afford to do the whole job, which is all of your downstairs flooring in the same material. You don't want to end up with a patchwork again.

I will definitely check out some of these suggestions. We live in the north central Midwest and need carpet for our family area. I love my cherry floor, but it is way too dark for my kitchen on the north side of the house that has dark cherry cabs and black granite counters. It would be a cave. I am looking at Alterna And Earthwerks vinyl tile. I have 2 fifty pound dogs also.

Thought I would update everyone. I had the kitchen/dining and hallway to garage quoted for Alterna. I am kind of depressed. I need 500 Sq. feet and even though they think they can put something over the tile to even it out before installing Alterna, it will cost in the $5000 range. My husband just looked at me when I told him. No answer. I am now thinking of buying a rug to put under the kitchen table. I currently have 5 scatter rugs/runners throughout the area and after 7 years they need to be replaced. The only problem there is being unable to wash a rug as large as one that would be under my kitchen table.