long overdue kitchen update

what's that saying about time flying?

fun or no fun it sure is moving swiftly these days.

we've been busy around here with projects.

some fun, some not so fun.

some diy, some hio (hire it out!)

thought i'd catch up on the kitchen today. we've been working on our

little kitchen (on and off and as we have the funds) since we moved

in september of 2010.

here's how she looked when we looked at the house

in august of 2010 (still occupied by previous owners).

it's a small galley kitchen. this is the view from one end, where they had

a table and chairs. just beyond the counter on the right is a swing door leading

into the dining room. behind the bi-fold door is the washer/dryer and pantry.

and a window that looks into the front yard. light!!

and the view from the bi-fold door. on the other side of the fridge is a

door leading to the side of the house and driveway. on the left,

just beyond the counter is a doorway leading into the living area.

since we moved in we have ripped out upper cabs and put in open shelves,

replaced formica counter tops with butcher block, replaced the shallow

stainless sink with a deep white porcelain sink and new faucet,

replaced some lighting, replaced fridge, painted lower cabs, removed bifold door to

laundry room letting so much more light in and added shelves in the

pantry/laundry room for additional storage and organization.

you can read about some of that here and here and here.

there were two items on our list for the kitchen that we have been

waiting on. replacing the nasty floor and building a banquette where

the previous owners had the table.

because we needed the space we used the breakfast nook for storage until

we had the money to do those projects and could figure out the best way for our

family to function in a space four times smaller than our previous kitchen.

this is what that end of  the kitchen looked like until last month. i sold the dresser-turned-island

and the china cabinet to offset the cost of the next phase.

after a month of research we decided to go with lowes to install our floor.

with a coupon and doing some of the prep work ourselves

(like moving appliances out, removing baseboards, etc.) they

were $1,000 less than any other quote we got.

we went with black and white checkerboard tile set on the diagonal.

love it.

here's the view toward the pantry.

for the banquette, our neighbor and his buddy did the work for us.

here is the finished product. with two hinged lids the amount of storage it

provides is fantastic!

there are still a few things to do at this end, like make bench cushions, find just the right light,

and decide what to do with wall space to the left and right. 

 when i finish up i'll fill you in on some of the details of these projects.

until then, this is where i'll be.

my new favorite spot to run our household.

~ stacy ~

master makeover in progress

i was a little caught off gaurd by the calender today.

january has really gotten away from me! 

we've had snow days, scheduled days off, and sick kids.

the only thing all this means is that my project list is

getting restructured.

but that's life right?

if having kids has taught me anything it's that

flexibility makes life a lot easier.

a lesson that has not come easy for this highly structured gal!

today, because bean was home and passed out on the sofa

i decided to get started on our master bedroom which

is within earshot of the sofa.

it's a project i wasn't going to hit until spring,

but, i had the paint so i figured why not!

i have done absolutely nothing to our master since

we moved in last september other than our bathroom

and my closet.

below is a very before picture. it's actually an mls pic and what we saw

when we first looked at the home. so, none of it is our stuff.

their bedframe, while very nice, really overwhelmed this room so we sold our

bedframe before we moved

with plans to do something a little different for a headboard.

it's impossible to see the wall color with the lighting in this photo.

it's a fleshy pink color. i have previously described

it as resembling the underbelly of a pig. not a great color.

this looked a lot better on my camera than it does here.

the left side is the new color, rice grain by sherwin williams, mixed

by home depot. love behr's paint and primer in one.

the right side is the old pinkish wall.

rice grain. it only took one coat of behr p and p. awesome!

the trim and molding, currently a creamy white, will

be painted a bright white.



all walls were painted today except this one. it's going to be an accent

wall and will receive a treatment of horizontal

planks, painted white.

source

i'm hoping to land somewhere between these two looks.

the above pic is clean and fresh and below is

rustic and fresh, and a little less perfect which suits

us better.

source

it will be my first project using my new nail gun and compressor so

join me in praying that i don't land in the hospital with a nail driven through

my hand. just kidding, mom! i'll be fine.

diy fail

when we ripped the upper cabinets out of our kitchen pieces of our

undesireable popcorn ceiling came down with them. i seriously thought about

scraping the whole thing right then and there but pastor j

would have been most unhappy with me. we have had

a disrupt-the-routine kind of project going

on since we moved in. . . so, the popcorn

ceiling stays.

but, the patches need touching up. i did paint the strips that

had drywall exposed so it wasn't so obvious but it still looks bad.

today was my day to tackle the patch work. something i should have done before

 i put the open shelves up but i was a tad impatient to get those up

and decked out.  i covered everything up and pulled out the can-o-texture.

it sounded easy enough.

1. cover everything.

2. shake can for 1 minute.

3. hold upright.

4. pull trigger making half second sweeps.

5. there are 8-10 "sweeps" in the can.

okay, cool.

NOT!!

this was a disaster of a diy project!! first, this stuff flies everywhere when you spray it.

everywhere! except the place i want it to go. the area i need to cover

is a long thin line, about 12 feet. for the life of me i could not hit that

thin line. after about five failed sweeps the nozzle clogged and i had to step down to

wash the goey textured mess out of my hair.

there has got to be a better way!



love me some open shelves!

progress is being made in the kitchen. i have a few more details

to work out and then i'll show ya around.

a decision and some board and batten

thanks for the input on my small counter top dilemma. 

while the difference in wood doesn't bother me i have decided

to do bead board. i think the 1x4 would have shortened

the wall once we got the open shelving up and the whole purpose of doing

this was to create a feeling of more space.  kinda like

someone with short legs wearing a large cuffed pant, it shortens an already

short leg. or something like that.

while going back and forth on this decision i couldn't just sit idle so here's what i worked on

over the weekend.

a faux board and batten treatment.

try not to be distracted by the mess in the foreground and background.

our focus here are the two walls on each side of the

room opening.

to the left, just out of the picture is our front door.

so when you walk in the house the sitting room is on your left and the dining

on your right. after we opened up all this space

if left a very non-distinct entry. i wanted to do something that

defined the space and give us a place to hang

stuff.

this did the job. using mdf we just cut it to size and

put it up with a bit of glue and a nail gun.

i put it on the short wall just to the right of the door which you cannot

really see, the wall behind the door and to the left after walking in, just past

the sitting room.

after the mdf was attached i caulked it, primed it, and painted it with

a semi gloss ultra white, same as the trim.

also, don't mind the little boys wandering around aimlessly

wondering what mom is doing now.

i added some hooks for our coats and bags

and they will never come down because. . .  putting screws

into mdf? kind of a mess. at least for me. but they are in there

good!

it's certainly not perfect but i'm pretty happy with it. the mdf

was cheap and i was able to get all my cuts out of one sheet.

the horizontal pieces are 3.5 inches and the verticle pieces are

1.5 inches.

after it was nailed to the wall i applied putty and sanded. i found the mdf to be pretty hard to sand.

as a result it is not as smooth as i would like and those flaws really

show with a semi-gloss paint. i may try to go back later with my palm sander

 and smooth out the imperfections and repaint. but for now this will

be just fine.

i will be doing the same treatment in our hall bathroom (and those cuts have already been made out of the same sheet purchased for the entry) so i'll have

another chance to work out the kinks.

also, i hung this guy. little by little we

are replacing all the brass light fixtures in the house.

we can't afford to buy the fixtures i really want from barn light electric

so, for the entry, i settled for an outdoor light from lowes.

it works just fine. and, i hung it myself. that was a first for me. :)


think i'll link up at cottage instincts!



calling all diy'ers!

i need opinions!!

our kitchen reno is under way. the upper cabs are out.

the walls are prepped and drying waiting for the next step.

the butcher block counter is in.

the sink is in.

when i started  this i didn't know what

i was going to do for backsplash. i knew i wasn't

going to buy another slab of butcher block

just to get a 1x4 cut for the backsplash.

if money weren't an issue i may have

done that, but as it stands. . . not happening.

so, i was thinking i may not have one and rather

do beadboard all the way up. or maybe board and batten.

in the end i decided against these because there

is not a natural stop point on  that wall. i would

have had to cover the whole wall on that side of

the kitchen and i didn't want to do  that.

so, i ran  up to lowes and bought a 1x4, came home and made my cuts

and tried to stain it to match my counters. impossible.

here is my question. do you think it looks bad. like really bad

to have the mix of wood and varying color?

be honest.

here are some pics to give you some different angles. the darker spots

are a rougher texture on the wood.


i know the real designers out  there might give this a giant
no but there are probably lots of things in my
house that would get that

so i need other input. i am normally pretty decisive on
decor issues but not this one.

i am open to scrapping it or keeping it.

linking up to funky junk interiors.

out with the old. . .

it's a rainy, cool, fall day here in south

carolina.

a good day to stay inside, enjoy a hot drink,

light some candles, and. . . 

enjoy the sounds of a kitchen demo! 

this is what's happening around here today.

upper cabs and soffit are coming out. old white laminate that stains

super easily is coming out. old sink that was only 5 inches deep is coming out.

going in. . .

oak butcher block, a deep white sink, and open shelving.

my inpiration kitchen is laura's from pure style home.

isn't it great? my colors will be different and i have a window

over the sink (and a much smaller space!) but the

concept will be similar. want to see this kitchen's before?

check it out here.

by the time the sun is shining again my countertops and sink will be installed

and my walls will be ready for me to tackle. to save some money

i'll be doing the open shelving myself.  fingers crossed that

i can pull it off!!

is it 2011 yet?

man, we have had one of those "one thing after another" seasons over the last six weeks. you know the kind. . . the car that starts becoming a money pit, unexpected medical bills, sick kid after sick kid, a growing list of household projects on a shrinking budget, blah, blah, blah. . .

i seem to be unable to rest until this little cottage of ours is to our liking.  with the last several weeks being so hectic i couldn't tackle some of the larger projects but i did manage to get our tiny little bathroom updated.

it was one of those projects that just happened. you know the kind? i didn't have a plan or a vision and it wasn't on my agenda for the day. as a result i didn't even snap a before picture for you, so i'll have to 'paint' you a picture of the before.

here it is today. not an "after," but an "almost done."

what we started with in here were walls that were a fleshy color.

i honestly don't know how to describe the color; most of the house was painted

with it. fleshy with pink undertones. not attractive. the cabinet

in this bath was a standard oak with modern silver pulls.

because i needed to do this one on a dime i went to

our shed and pulled from paint we already had.

the vanity was painted alabaster by sherwin williams and i used some old rusty pulls

i had on hand from a project that never saw the light of day.

the walls are blue hubbard, a sherwin williams color i had mixed

at home depot with behr paint and primer in one. this color was

used in our front room and i had just enough left over for

our small bath.

the wall over the toilet had a standard towel bar. i removed that and filled

the holes and personalized the space a bit with pics of

the boys and warmed it up with a couple candles.

you can see the wall across from the toilet in the reflection of the mirror. that is the only

floor to ceiling wall space in the bathroom. the previous owners had

a vertical towel holder on that wall that held about six towels.

i put up a chippy shelf with four rusty hooks.

i picked  this up at hobby lobby for 50% off, making it $10.

so, now we have a place to hang our towels. hanging them over the doors was

not working for me! :)

this is another hook i had on hand. it has three different

sized hooks that pivot. i took down the ring towel hook on the wall

beside the vanity and replaced it with this. i need to go back and

paint the silver screws i used to put it up. i touch of hammered bronze spray

paint should do the job!

and because i love to display my blue ball and atlas jars i had to

make a spot for one. i just shoved a bunch of

white candles in and called it done.

to finish it out i will frame out the mirror and change the lighting

and faucet. i will likely put a couple cute knobs on those

two faux drawer fronts on the vanity, too.

but for now, it's a big improvement!

and the best part? the total out of pocket was $10 because we used what we had.







swimming in paint

phase two of home reno is underway.

painting.

followed by painting and then some more painting.

oh, and putting horizontal planks in the dining and sitting room.

while i am working on neutralizing our walls

i thought i would show you one of the

furniture makeovers i did the week

before we moved.

did i really redo three pieces of furniture while

packing our entire house, enrolling the kids in new schools,

and taking care of all the administrative details of moving and closing

on two houses?

uh, yes. and that may explain my fatigue!

this little table was a piece of cake though.

like so many pieces in my home this once belonged to

my grandmother. it had a marble

top that was never secured. it wasn't pretty marble either.

it was icky, with swirls of brown and lot's of stains.

(sorry, in my haste to rid myself of that slab

of marble i got rid of it before snapping a pic)

i had a table runner over it for years and

used it in our upstairs hall to hold a lamp and some of the kids' books.

there was some decorative wood inlay on the drawer that i also wasn't crazy

about along with a brass rim around  the lower shelf.

i took the easy way out and just sprayed it all!

(sorry about the poor quality pics. this piece doesn't have a home yet so i just stuck it here for the pic)

i had some wood laying around and, remarkably, one piece fit

the top perfectly.

it even  had a beveled edge on the front.

all i did was stain it and glue it down with some liquid nails.

add a couple new knobs and she's got a whole new look.

for those interested in the details of the paint job i used a spray primer (kilz), followed

by rustoleum's heirloom white, and used deft lacquer spray as a protective finish.

i sanded ever so lightly with 220 grit in between each coat.

************************

did i mention i am painting the whole house white? alabaster, to be exact. this is new for me as i have always
had color on the wall. i made great progress today and will hopefully have some
reveals of some or our rooms in a week or so.

in other news. . . in my fatigued state i apparently put my paint roller and brush (thick with paint) in the freezer. i went to look for them after i picked the kids up from school and couldn't
find  them anywhere. later when i went in the freezer, there they were. frozen.

in between freezing paint brushes and taking care of the fam i also have some special orders
for the thomas company.
oh, and did i mention i had an emergency tooth extraction yesterday?
yeah, that was fun.

i think i'll take the rest of the night off. :)

y'all have a good one!