Kitchen Reveal!

 You may recall that we bought a "new" (but very old) house back in June and we have been making it our own ever since.
If you missed it here are the links:
Living room
Dining room
Abbey's room

My parents came into town for a few weeks and we decided to take full advantage of the kid entertaining, and handy man work. We took on the kitchen. If you have ever done a kitchen before than you know how much work it can be. (hence the sewing projects slowing down a bit) We painted the cabinets in our last house as well and we learned a lot. So I will break it down a little for anyone who is thinking about doing the same thing. This time around was way better.

 Here is our kitchen just after we moved in. The wall paper border still makes my skin crawl just looking at it. So first things first.
The base of the cabinets were already painted white, (thank you previous owners) It would have been the part we would have painted by hand using a high density foam roller, but thankfully we could skip that part.
We did remove all cabinets and drawers and gave them all a good scrubbing. Really use some elbow grease and get those things clean.
When you take them down label them! You don't want to play a guessing game putting them back up.
After they were stripped of all the hardware, (handles, hinges etc...) dirt and grime, we used liquid sander and gave them another good scrub down with the liquid sander.
Then let it dry, they should be tacky until they dry and then the gloss should be gone and they may feel a little gritty.
Then we took spray primmer (in a spray can) and gave the high traffic areas a light spray. (such as around the handles and edges) Let that dry (about 10 min)
Next for the paint we used a professional paint sprayer borrowed from a friend.

The pros of using a sprayer:

• The finish is super smooth,
• Thin coats stick better,
• No brush strokes in the paint, 
• Super fast. 

The cons of using the sprayer: 
The one we used required a 5 gallon bucket and we used 1 and half buckets (so about 7 gallons) this is way more than was needed but when you spray there tends to be a lot of over spray and that is paint wasted, also about a gallon of paint gets sucked up in the hose alone.


So overall it costs more to spray but, it is faster and has a way better outcome.

 We also sprayed the bar stools which is WAY easier than painting by hand. For now we simply sprayed the old hinges and knobs with a metal spray to make them look more current. (hardware really adds up when doing a kitchen)

 We put in a new light over the sink

 Before there was the wallpaper border around the top of the cabinet and then crown molding above that. We sprayed the wallpaper with vinegar and water and it came off pretty easily. Then we painted over where the wallpaper was and painted the crown molding white. It instantly made the kitchen feel taller.

 The walls of the kitchen got the same light icy blue color as the living room and dining room which is Valspar's Grey Opal.

 We wanted a pop of color somewhere which was going to be the chairs but we didn't want to buy 5 gallons of a bright color just to spray them so we decided to paint the toe kick under the counter, a nice pop of teal. (I think we are still deciding if we like it) It only requires a few sample size paint cans so we may switch it up from time to time.

Most of all after all the hard work I just love stepping into a bright and white kitchen and that it finally matches the dining room. Ah heaven. Oh and done from start to finish (including dry time) in 1 week.
We will be back to sewing 101 tomorrow!
see you then