Year: 2015

DIY Kitchen Transformation: Second Time’s a Charm!

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This is after the first coat...I think it's going to be brilliant with the second coat!
This is after the first coat…I think it’s going to be brilliant with the second coat! Compare to the “before” picture.

So…um…yeah…we had the wrong kind of primer the first go-round.

This morning I picked up a can of Zinnser Bullseye 1-2-3 primer and it made a HUGE difference! I was able to sand down the blemishes in the primer job before applying the first coat of paint and it didn’t peel off in two seconds.

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DIY Kitchen Transformation: The Importance of Thorough Prep Work

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We had a pretty substantial setback today on our journey to (like) new cabinets. Dave and I had read plenty of DIY tips suggesting that if one’s stained and sealed cabinets are old enough, a simple chemical treatment with a “sander deglosser” is all we would need before applying the primer, then paint. Boy were … Read more

Timmy’s First Rubik’s Cube Competition

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Timmy studies his scrambled cube for 15 seconds before the timer starts.

Last week, Timmy was on a team representing his elementary school at a regional Rubik’s Cube competition. It was his first experience, and was the first time his school had entered a team. Timmy was the only 4th grader, the rest of his team were 5th graders. While the team didn’t take home any prizes, they certainly are competitive and I’m sure all the students learned a lot.

Dave, Jacob, and I certainly learned a lot. We had never seen a competition like that!

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DIY Kitchen Transformation: Bead Board

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Tonight we added some beadboard to the kitchen island.
Tonight we added some beadboard to the kitchen island. This will all be painted by this weekend.

Tonight we continued our kitchen work by installing a panel of bead board to one side of the kitchen island. This was not only a cosmetic modification, but also somewhat structural: the original plain paneling was dried out and cracking. We simply glued the panel on with Liquid Nails and then nailed it into place.

We were challenged with cutting the board perfectly. While our table saw took care of the major cuts, we purposefully erred on not cutting it down enough. Dave chose to sand down any longer edges rather than risk splitting the wood with running it through our table saw for little slivers.

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DIY Kitchen Transformation: Testing Island Colors

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Bear with me while I try to figure out the iPhone version of my blog editor. Tonight we tried out a couple “browns” for the kitchen island. This is a primer-less paint, and we are just covering this panel with beadboard so you aren’t seeing our “A game” in terms of paint prowess. We overwhelmingly … Read more

(Mostly) DIY Kitchen Transformation

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Ignore the mess, it's a big-enough task to keep that center island clean. Jacob was off to the side waiting to put some balsa glider parts on it.
Our kitchen as of April 2015. Ignore the mess, every time we prepare a meal things just seem to explode. Jacob was off to the side waiting to put some balsa glider parts on the clean island.

We are embarking on our next DIY project over the next few months. Our plan is to make phased improvements to our kitchen between now and the end of 2015. We’re taking our time on this, in part so we can save up money and pay cash for each phase, but also because we have to fit the DIY tasks in between our busy work schedules.

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