Mini Kitchen Reno [part 1]
What is wrong with me? This post was started on SEPTEMBER 30TH, 2012. It has been edited once (what? how?) and has since lingered in my drafts since JANUARY 10th!!! Can you believe this insanity? Seriously! This is how much of it was done:
Since we got possession of the house June 12th, there have been an overwhelming amount of thoughts and ideas going through my brain and the evidence is all over my "For The Home" Pinterest board!
So. Embarrassing.This was one of the very first posts I ever meant to publish since starting this little blog last August and it should have been a part of the 31 Day Series, but that obviously never happened! I was just so overwhelmed by the thought of posting an unfinished kitchen reno post that it never happened and ended up sitting, untouched, for months! So silly, right?THIS is the kind of pressure I'm talking about! Blogging can make you feel so inadequate sometimes. But you know what? I don't care. I'm going to post my bad, blurry, inexperienced-blogger photos for you anyway because believe me, it's better than never ever posting this. And believe me, at this point, I NEED to do this even if just to prove a point to my silly self that I will not let this 11-month old blog draft go ignored! Plus, you'll get the jist of what's happening here, blurry/bad photos and all, so I'm not too worried.
Let's start at the beginning.
This is the kitchen exactly as it was when we saw the house for the first time, then when we signed the papers, then when the inspection was done. (Note: It might be totally wrong of me to show you these photos because those are the previous owner's things.)
You may be thinking, "What's wrong with this kitchen? It's perfectly fine!" Yep. That's exactly what I thought when we saw it.
ALL THREE TIMES.
Until 2 months later, when we got the keys. Instantly, I looked at Alex and said, "Our kitchen is PEACH!!!"
My mom can totally back me up on this: I do not like peach walls! She painted a hallway a coral-peach once and I told her it looked like puke. Sorry mom. I was a teenager!
So for the sake of better understanding, let's look at the colour scheme and general 'before' state of this lovely ol' kitchen of mine.
As you can see, it wasn't even just one shade of peach. It was an explosion of orange-y and yellow-y tones all over the place. EVEN THE CEILING! AAAAAAAAHHH!!! Truthfully, the floors are fine (for now...), but all the yellow in the room made them look sadder and dingy.
SPEAKING OF DINGY! THOSE COUNTER-TOPS, PEOPLE!!!
Ok, so nothing against laminate counter-tops - they are budget friendly and can actually last a long time, but HELLO! White? Come on, now... we've all seen it... you wash strawberries, cutting off the tops and happily place them on the counter-top, excited for the huge ice cream sundae healthy fruit snack you're about to eat. You lift up a strawberry, and there it is... the red stain on your white counter-top. Deadly. Never coming off/taking way too much effort to figure out how to clean. You're now the girl with the stained counter-top. I DO NOT want to be that girl!
Within 3 days of moving in, this happened:
You can get a much better idea for the colour and counter-top situation now, can't you!?! Yeah... I was COLOUR BLIND! At this point, though, I was also determined to win the battle against the peach kitchen. I did some pretty extensive research on Pinterest to see what other people were using to make over their once ugly kitchens, and Rust-Oleum seemed to have a pretty trustworthy and well known product on the market. Here's what it looks like, in case you ever need to tackle this yourself:
[Top photo is from Rust-Oelum's site] In the area we live in, Home Depot and Lowes were the only two places I was able to find this kit and prices were exactly the same - $99 for the small kit, which comes in either a light or dark. They can be tinted to any of the colours on the box (we went with Pure White), but I have also been told you can actually tint it to whatever colour you want, so go nuts! The box comes with everything, so you literally need nothing else but a brush to go with it, and you should make it a good one! Do not use a roller - I have seen some horror stories of people who tried this with a roller, so I advise against it, though I didn't try it myself, so what do I know? The instructions are very clear and Rust-Oleum has videos on their website as well, in case you have questions. The deglosser is THE BEST! The fact that all of my doors didn't have to be sanded down was a major bonus.
Alright, so deglossing isn't exactly a walk in the park... you have to use those green scrubbers and they eventually start to fall apart because the deglosser is quite strong. Wear gloves! You also need to clean it thoroughly with warm water before painting and allow cabinets to dry well before painting. We did this (mostly) outside since it was July, so it was almost enjoyable. No... I'm lying. None of this is enjoyable, but the results sure are and it still beats sanding!
[Despite all the photos and clever product placement, Rust-Oleum isn't sponsoring this post. They don't even know I exist! I just happened to use their product and live to tell you all about it!]
Now I'm going to be a mean blogger and tell you that Part 2 is coming up this week, so watch out for it! Sorry guys... I'm way too wordy to get this all done in one single post and this is already like 1000 words long!
Look out for part two where you'll get to see the back-splash and counter-top transformations! Get ready with your Oooooohhhhhs and Aaaaaahhhhhhs!!
xoxo
