Our Kitchen: Before & After

As promised, our kitchen re-do.  You may remember my recent post about my love for white kitchens {and white trim; in my opinion, the more white, the better}.  When we were looking for houses, we found very few {in our price range} with a white kitchen.  So my hubby said, "babe, if you want a white kitchen, we'll get you a white kitchen," or something like that.  How sweet, eh? {He also said I could make a "new house" look as "old as I want," but that we weren't going to buy an old home}. :)

This redo has been pretty budget-friendly.  The biggest project (but worth every drop of sweat) was painting the cabinets white (thank you, thank you, thank you to my parents for the help).  It took two weekends.  After sanding off the shine, we painted two coats of primer (we used Kilz odorless oil-based primer) and then two coats of paint (Behr semigloss in swan wing).  The walls are the same color of white, except in egg-shell finish.  We also added some stainless steel hardware (all bought at Home Depot).  And the countertops were formica with this oak trim on the sides.  We would like to {eventually} replace them, so in the mean time we tried a new countertop glaze, Rustoleum's Countertop Coating in the color putty.  They've held up pretty well...they are supposed to be scratch- and chip-resistant; there are a few minor chips but I could probably touch them up with more of the paint.  The worst part of the using the countertop coating {besides the smell} was waiting three whole days for it to dry before using the counters.  Oh, and how can I forget about the light fixtures?  We actually spray painted them in a metallic "brushed nickel" spray paint {they were brown before}. It's amazing what a few coats of paint can do to transform a room. 

Here are some pictures.

BEFORE:

If I remember right, this picture was taken before we actually owned the house.  It's my hubby (right) and our realtor. 

And AFTER:

One other thing we did was we got the cabinet doors routed out {by a carpenter} and then put glass in them.  It cost about $25 for the pair plus the cost of glass.  Besides the white paint, this is probably my favorite change to our kitchen - I'm planning on doing another cupboard door or two as well.

The bamboo shade was from Target.  I might put another one of the patio door (on right) because the morning sun is super bright. 

Have you ever considered putting a lamp in your kitchen?  I love, love, love lamps on kitchen counters...they give such an unexpected glow in the kitchen (above).

My new basil plant (above).  I'm making a caprese appetizer for Kiley's shower this weekend, so I will be using this plant (bowl is from Crate and Barrel a few years ago).

I like to call this Phase One because there are many more things that I would like to do to the kitchen in the future.  What are they?  Glad you asked.  I would REALLY like to get black granite countertops and a white carrara marble island countertop.  After that, it would be fun to put in a white subway tile backsplash, a "new," "old-looking" bridge faucet, some crown molding on the kitchen cupboards at the top, and of course stainless steel appliances, if they are still in style by the time we get to that! And the lighting could use a litle re-arrangement and a few new fixtures. To be specific, I would like to get some stainless industrial-looking lights above the island. 

Can you spot any of my thrift store finds?  The chairs were all from a thrift store - I painted them black and reupholstered the fabric.  Also, the mini-glass/marble cake platter on the island is second-hand.  The chalkboard above the desk as well.  Oh, and the white pitcher holding my wooden spoons is Le Creuset, I think I bought it for $2!

Oh, and don't comment on how clean my kitchen is...it rarely looks like this, and I just moved all the junk from one room to the next for pictures!