07. June 2015 · Comments Off on DIY Kitchen Transformation: The New Floor Revealed · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , , , , ,
Can you see the difference?

Can you see the difference? The vibrant wood grain should be the biggest difference you see, but we also nudged the color a little bit to make it more brown…less yellow/orange in color.

On Thursday and Friday, we had a contractor come in to sand and re-stain our hardwood floors. Jeff from “A Cut Above Hardwood Flooring” was recommended to us by our carpet cleaning guy.

This piece of floor is continuous from the front door to the kitchen, and to access the front door, garage, basement, and staircase, you will step on the hardwood. I’ll discuss how we dealt with that in a minute.

As mentioned before, there were some areas to the floor that had clearly suffered water damage, but had subsequently dried out. The wood was structurally sound, but the sealer and stain color were messed up. It was important to me that those areas get extra attention, and Jeff did that very well. More »

03. June 2015 · Comments Off on DIY Kitchen Transformation: Overwhelming Choices · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , , ,
IMG_1756

So here we are again — time for the next installment of where we are with the kitchen transformation.

As you can see, we have a *very* white kitchen now. I absolutely love my “new” cabinets, and am excited for the next stages of our project. Those stages aren’t DIY, though.

Next up will be the floor refinishing. I’ll make sure to post before and after pictures when that project is done this weekend. The floor is in desperate need of sanding and refinishing, so we will take advantage of that work to darken the color some. I hope it turns out as well as I’m envisioning. More »

24. May 2015 · Comments Off on DIY Kitchen Transformation: A (Partial) Cabinet Reveal! · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , ,
A well-framed photo of the doors and drawers in place. There is still one drawer face missing, and I just barely cut if off.

A well-framed photo of the doors and drawers in place. There is still one drawer face missing just outside this view, and I just barely cut if off.

Today Dave put the doors back in their places in the kitchen, and also installed the new hardware. I am incredibly happy with how it turned out. More »

22. May 2015 · Comments Off on DIY Kitchen Transformation: Cabinet Hardware · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , ,
I LOVE THEM!!!

I LOVE THEM!!!

Tonight we started putting the doors back up. I’m so incredibly happy with how much brighter our kitchen looks now!

We also added some hardware, which we picked up at Ikea. They complement our appliance doors. Hopefully they help keep dirty hands off the new white cabinetry. More »

11. May 2015 · Comments Off on DIY Kitchen Transformation: Crown Moulding Installation · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , , , ,

This past weekend Dave installed the crown moulding around the tops of our cabinets. This isn’t a super-tall design, we wanted something subtle, yet elegant.

Later this week and this weekend we will start the priming and painting of the rest of the cabinets. We have a paint sprayer to use for the doors, but will hand-paint the cabinet bases.

We also picked up our hardware for the cabinet doors and drawers. I can’t wait to see how awesome they look when installed.

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The moulding is white because we chose a PVC composite.

More »

26. April 2015 · Comments Off on DIY Kitchen Transformation: Painted Kitchen Island · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , , ,
Every step we take towards the improved kitchen is making me hate the countertops more and more....

Every step we take towards the improved kitchen is making me hate the countertops more and more….

Tonight we were able to put the kitchen back together, at least for now.

What do you think? More »

25. April 2015 · Comments Off on DIY Kitchen Transformation: Second Time’s a Charm! · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,
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. More »

25. April 2015 · Comments Off on DIY Kitchen Transformation: The Importance of Thorough Prep Work · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , ,
The prep work we did wasn't good enough...

The prep work we did last night wasn’t good enough…

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 we wrong!

Last night we had applied two coats of Kilz primer to the island and cabinet doors, and this evening, as Dave took a sanding block to some of the drips from last night’s work, large pieces of the primer came right off!

It turned out the deglosser didn’t do jack.

So tonight we had to break out the big guns: trisodium phosphate (TSP) and an orbiter sander to get all of the original primer off. It isn’t pretty. We will also be switching the primer to a “bonding primer“. We probably should have chosen the bonding primer all along…

So tomorrow we try all this again…we need to get the prep work right the first time, so this paint doesn’t chip and peel on us in a matter of months!

23. April 2015 · Comments Off on DIY Kitchen Transformation: No Turning Back Now · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , ,
Primed and ready for the dark paint!

Primed and ready for the dark paint!

Today was the primer for the island. Once we started down this road, we told ourselves “There’s no turning back now”.

The island itself will be ready for the real paint color tomorrow, but we will need to degrease and sand down the cabinet doors more than the rest of the surfaces. The doors need a LOT of prep work, since they bear the brunt of the 16-years worth of grease and grime.

Our plan is to have the kitchen island painted by the end of this weekend. I’m not completely sure when we’ll get to the rest of the cabinets, which we’re painting white. But we plan to space things out some. As of now, I can still use most of my kitchen, which is nice.

22. April 2015 · Comments Off on DIY Kitchen Transformation: Bead Board · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , ,
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. More »