12.31.2013
The Kitchen Makeover
White appliances, standard pendant lights, tan paint on the walls. We painted the walls BM Revere Pewter, replaced the pendants with West Elm's globe pendants, and got a stainless steel microwave, oven, and dishwasher. We wanted to paint the cabinets white, but decided first we needed new countertops and a bigger island. The space for the kitchen table was too squished. We were always scooting around chairs and tucking them in, and it was tricky coming in the house through the sliding door with the table right there in front of the door. So we decided that the best solution would be to make the island bigger so we could eat around it and ditch the table.
We asked our favorite carpenter to do our island extension, but he was too busy with other jobs to squeeze our small job in, so B decided he would do it himself.
We ripped the tile off the top of the island, and then I chose my favorite chunky island legs off tablelegs.com, and then B also ordered the aprons and corner pieces he would need to extend the island.
He did it all by himself. My banker husband is a secret handyman.
And this is how our kitchen looked for two weeks while we waited for our granite to be fabricated and installed.
Choosing granite is NOT FUN! I spent hours wandering huge granite slab warehouses, and found several pieces that I wanted only to find later that they were already sold or not the right size.
Our inspiration for our kitchen remodel came from this kitchen I found on Pinterest.
The granite they used in their kitchen is called Cambrian Black with a satin finish. I found the same granite at Arizona tile but it was $30 sf.
Not happening.
And so I wandered granite stores and made lots of phone calls and we almost chose Absolute Black with a honed finish. But after doing lots of research we learned that the honed finish shows every smudge and grease mark. So then we thought we'd go with a polished finish, but all our friends with black polished granite said they hated it because it shows smudges and dust too.
Finally I found the perfect granite. It was the Indian Pearl granite with a leather finish, and only $11 sf. The leather finish is not shiny and has a little texture to it, so it doesn't show smudges or dust. It looks very similar to the Cambrian black satin from our inspiration kitchen, for a fraction of the price. Yay.
When the granite guys came to install our granite it was the best day ever. Eating off plywood countertops is gross. Our granite guy said this was the biggest island he had ever made. It's 104 inches long and 66 inches wide. It's a beast.
Next step: Paint the cabinets.
Blah. Just typing those words and re-living this process in my head makes me want to run and hide. It is so so crappy. We knew it would be crappy so we tried to hire people to do it, but not even painters that we had come and quote us wanted to paint our cabinets. So we decided to look on the bright side, doing it ourselves would save us a couple thousand bucks. I did some research and we decided to follow this tutorial from Young House Love. We used the same primer and paint brand that they did, the only difference was that they rolled their cabinets, and we decided to buy a sprayer and spray them. We bought the Titan cap spray maxum 2 HVLP gun. It worked great.
We sanded each door front and back and rubbed them down with deglosser, then we layed them all out in the garage and began spraying. The spraying process took about two weeks of long nights.
The original plan was to roll the cabinet frames, so I applied the first layer of primer with a brush and roller and it took me eight hours. There was no way I was doing that three more times, so we taped everything off (which took about four hours) and then B sprayed the kitchen. We couldn't use the kitchen for three days, one of which I was teaching preschool. We couldn't use the sinks, the fridge, the pantry, nothing. Every morning I would drive to Raleys to buy yogurt and other fridge items to feed our family. At this point I was so exhausted and sick of the mess that I pulled into the Raley's parking lot one morning and just cried in my car for a little while.
Stupid, stupid kitchen cabinets. .
The day after we got home we re-hung all of our cabinet doors. It took eight hours.
Then the project sat for about two weeks until we got up the energy to lay our backsplash, and B cased out the window and put board and batten on the side of the island.
And now it's done.
Our new oven is Electrolux. We are very happy with it, it's a great oven.
We splurged and got a Blue Star stovetop. B informed me that it has always been his dream to own a Blue Star stove top. "Really?" I said, "I've known you for eleven years and I've never heard you mention it until now."
Anyway, his dream came true.
The vegetable sink.
I got these stools at an RC Willey sidewalk sale. I went to the preview sale the night before and saw the stools and knew they were perfect, and only $25 each! So cheap. But I couldn't buy them until the next morning at the sale. So that night I couldn't sleep because I was so worried that someone would get there before me and buy my stools, so I finally just got out of bed at 5am and got to RC Willey around 5:30. I was the only person there. I waited around by myself in the dark until around 7am when other customers started to show up and got in line behind me. Finally they opened the store at 8:30am and I got my stools.
They had black fabric on the cushion that I covered with this striped fabric, and then I covered them in vinyl. I don't like the vinyl...I don't like how shiny and thick it is....but it's better than dirty stained seat cushions.
And the stripes bring color to the kitchen and match my family room pillows.
Here's a close-up of the cabinet paint. B did a great job spraying. It looks better than some of the professional jobs we've seen. I'm proud of him.
The kids got jealous of all the pictures I was taking of the kitchen. They were begging, "Take our picture Mom! Take it!"
Finally I complied.
Once again, Before:
and after:
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