Who tears their kitchen apart the first week in November?!?!?!?

ME!!! It seems that our family always starts a project right before the holidays, like we need more pressure?!?!? Last year it was the utility room and bathroom. Those projects never made it to the blog, mostly because they aren’t/weren’t completely finished. The kitchen WILL be different! I’m sooo excited about it!! It’s been something that I’ve wanted to do for quite a while, so let me take you back to the beginning…

As I’ve mentioned before, we live in our basement, building “up” without taking out a loan. It’s been a MUCH longer process than we had ever anticipated. The economy going south hasn’t helped at all either. Anyway, we started out with a “this is only temporary” mentality and we didn’t put much thought into looks, only functionality. The longer we are down here, the more I want something that looks good! The kitchen started out with salmon-y pink, formica cabinets, which were given to us. Now, this was almost 10 years ago, so no one was sharing how to paint formica on their DIY blog, so we worked with what we had and I put up some hideous wall paper to coordinate. Several years later, we had to rebuild the cabinets around the sink because of a moisture problem. Unfortunately, we couldn’t match the old salmon-y counter top and had to get something new. Could have been a great opportunity….

However, Hubby decided to “surprise me” and bring home new counter tops! Yeah…trouble is we have different tastes. Since they were already cut and couldn’t go back, I again worked with what I had and went from “salmony-pink” to “grey-green”!

I look back know and call this my “what was I thinking phase?” At the time I did it I must have been happy but now I keep wondering, “what was I thinkin’?!?!?”. This is what I’ve had for the last 5 or 6 years….

So, last spring, when my DIY solar street lamp won at the DIY Club for March, part of the prize was 2 gallons of paint from Mythic Paint. I knew exactly what I wanted to do with them…paint the kitchen and get rid of all that green!  I had been toying with painting the cabinets black to coordinate with the counter tops and possibly repainting the walls a beige with gray undertones instead of yellow. These are the colors that I chose.

               Cloud Burst                                                                          Almond Biscotti

                                                 

 

Then due to life happening over the summer and the thought that we might have to tear the sink cabinets out AGAIN, the painting the project went on hold.  While googling black cabinets recently I found this picture :

and my project idea was re-born! This is Emily’s kitchen from Chatting at the Sky. I haven’t told her yet that I’ve had a picture of her kitchen on my laptop for my background screen for inspiration, but I will.

Well after finding her kitchen and falling in love, the project went from a  simple painting the cabinets to a full blown “re-model” in my mind. The only problem? No money…. the more I thought about it the more I knew I could make it work, creatively, of course! I will be working with what I have, what I have been given or bartered for but will still have to buy some things. My original goal was to keep this under $100 out of pocket cash, but since I have decided on some tile and don’t want to give in on that, it will probably be more like $200. I am really excited about sharing my ideas on how to make this work so cheaply, but I’m also looking forward to getting some input! I hope you’ll follow along with me on this project, I’m sure I’ll need some encouragement as well as help! Like, what color trim paint would you use with the paint colors I’ve chosen? NOT “white”, we have basic white now and it doesn’t work for basement living…shows EVERYTHING!

I know I have some questions to answer and some comments to return, I’m not ignoring anyone, my laptop went down week before last and had to have everything re-installed. I’m still trying to get caught up!

If you’ve done a kitchen remodel and have any “what not to do” advice, I’d love to hear it! Tomorrow I will be sharing “The Plan”.