Kitchen Mini-Makeover - February 5 - March 15, 2013

Concurrent with my bathroom mini-makeover, I decided to do my kitchen as well. Since I was paying for my texture guy to come in and texture my bathroom, I figured that I should just have him do my kitchen too since I wanted to paint in there as well. The walls weren't nearly as bad in the kitchen compared to the rest of my house because it had never been wallpapered but I figured that it would be nice to have some uniformity and the ceiling was actually in pretty bad shape. In addition, we had a new oven and over-the-range microwave that needed to be installed. Even though our current oven was still in working condition, one of the stove burners completely didn't work at all and the the other ones pretty much only worked on high. And the microwave we had was given to us for free by some neighbors who upgraded theirs when we first moved in. Although it had done its job for a couple of years, it was not very powerful, the turntable didn't work (so the food didn't cook evenly), and it was also a counter microwave which took up our limited counter space so it was definitely time to upgrade.

We had already upgraded our fridge (July 2011) and installed a new dishwasher back in the spring of 2012. I got our fridge and dishwasher for a great price during a sale so I had been keeping my eyes open on the weekly circulars for a good sale on the matching oven and microwave literally for years (because we weren't in a huge rush). So when Lowe's had a great sale on the matching oven and microwave back in November of 2012, I jumped on it (with Brandon's permission, of course). However, I wanted Brandon to put in a new electrical outlet for the oven (because the previous owners of our home had awful electrical that was not upgraded or grounded) so the oven and microwave just sat in the living room for weeks. You can even see in this post the oven and microwave taking up half the space in our living room. (Seems like we always have some huge box taking up space in our tiny living room - here it is the boxes that held the new toilet). Eventually, Brandon installed the new electrical outlet in the kitchen so we got rid of our old oven and plugged in the new one. But the box with the microwave was moved into the office and stayed there for months. So we decided it was time to get that installed before the texture guy came since we would need to modify some cabinets.
Cost for new stainless steel Frigidaire Gallery electric oven and over-the-range microwave: $930.35

Here is how it all went down. Before we could install the over-the-range microwave, we needed to have a new electrical outlet installed for the microwave to plug in. Although Brandon had the ability to do this, he was really busy with work so we decided that it would be worth it to hire the an electrician. And while the electrician was there, we figured that he might as well replace the fridge outlet since it was an old one that wasn't grounded and we were using an adapter (kinda like this) for which I am sure was not up to code.
Cost for electrician to put in two outlets: $235.

After the electrical work was done, I called my contractor to install the microwave. Brandon and I (but mostly Brandon) had installed an over-the-range microwave just a few months earlier in our rental property and it was a pain in the butt so we decided it wouldn't be worth his time to do it, especially since our cabinets above the oven were too low and needed to be modified. Our cabinets are really gross (maybe original to the house?) and not in great condition so we didn't really care to cut into them a bit. Someday, we will completely replace the cabinets but not any day soon. So our contractor shortened the cabinets and installed the microwave. Brandon also insisted that the microwave vent out through the attic and roof so we didn't have kitchen smells hanging around the house and he did that as well.
Cost for the contractor: $40 (this was so cheap because we bought his services for a discount at a silent auction fundraiser at our church).

At this point, I could have had my texture guy come in to do the texture and then start painting but I figured that since we were doing all this work, I might as well replace the doors, trim, and base molding in the kitchen to match the rest of the house. Our old doors were the standard 6-panel doors but all our new doors in the house were 3-panel Craftsman style doors. So I ripped out the pantry door (which the previous owners had cut poorly at the bottom to accommodate new tile but still scraped the floor which was incredibly annoying) and door to the basement (which Brandon had slightly modified as seen in this post here) along with all the trim and base molding. The old doors also had hinges painted white (I hate painted hinges!) and door knobs that were so badly falling apart that they could cut your palm while you were opening it (we wondered why the previous owners had wrapped handkerchiefs around several of the doorknobs).

And while I was at it, I took everything out of my pantry so the walls and ceiling in there could be textured as well (we had a little bit of water damage in the ceiling in there from a broken swamp cooler that leaked years earlier). The funny thing is that I actually had just reorganized my pantry so I got a before picture of it but never took an after picture. But that didn't matter anyway since I ripped all the shelving out and had it redone.

Once the doors, trim, and molding were ripped out, the texture guy came and then I starting priming and painting. During this time, I moved the fridge, kitchen table, and stove to the middle of the kitchen and covered them with plastic drop cloths as well as my cabinets and counters. Which meant that I couldn't use my kitchen for about two weeks while all the work was being done (which meant that we ate out for about two weeks). These are expenses that I included in my post about the bathroom mini-makeover but here they are again:
Texture (for both bathroom and kitchen): $350
Supplies (paint brushes, rollers, tape, joint compound, caulk): $72.13
Paint & Primer (for both bathroom and kitchen): $57.66
Eating Out: $138.25?
Daycare Expense: $176

Once the texturing, priming, and painting was done, I had my contractor come back in to install the doors, trim, base molding, and pantry shelving (which we reused our old stuff) as well as try to fix up the area around the dishwasher that we cut out as seen in the picture below.
BEFORE:

AFTER:

Much better. Although we still need to figure out what we want to do with the tile...

Cost for new two new pre-hung doors: $145.31
Cost for labor (installing doors, trim, and base molding and reinstalling pantry shelves - I had all the trim and molding left over from our home renovation the year before): $150

Once all the professional work was complete, I just caulked the base molding and trim, did some paint touch-ups there, and then I was done. I literally finished up on Friday, March 15th. It was so nice to have my kitchen back and be able to cook again (even though I don't particularly like cooking but even I get sick of eating out for an extended period of time). Grey was born two days later.

But we weren't quite done yet...we had never replaced one window in my kitchen because we didn't want to waste the money when we planned to eventually rip it out because we want to build an addition on to the kitchen. But since the window was original to the house, it was single pane aluminum and terribly ugly and inefficient. It was so cold in winter that we had to put that plastic shrink wrap stuff over the window to make it tolerable but it was still really drafty when we sat down to eat. And because we live in an "up and coming" neighborhood, we worry a little bit about home burglaries and wanted something a little more secure that wouldn't so easily invite a break in. We also really had no idea when we would be able to afford an addition and I didn't want to wait years and years to have a new window. So two days after Grey was born, on the day that we returned home from the hospital, we had a new window installed in the kitchen. I just wish we had done it when we had all the other windows in the house replaced and there was a tax credit for it but better late than never.
Cost of new double pane, argon gas filled, triple low-E coated white vinyl slider window: $328.00

I wish I took before pictures but I forgot. But there are plenty of after pictures:

New, much more secure, efficient window. You can just imagine how cold we were eating our meals around our table next to the old window. It was kinda tough getting a picture of the window because of the backlighting but there it is. We still need to install some trim around it to match the other windows in the house because although you can't see it so well in the picture, there is a nasty tile windowsill that was painted and is chipping and ugly.

 Reinstalled pantry shelving that are actually spaced to accommodate cereal boxes (our cereal was previously on top of our fridge which was ugly and annoying). Now Lucy can reach the cereal and oatmeal and someday, get her own breakfast without waking us up. We actually lost a shelf in the pantry so we could have more space in between each shelf but we installed a door organizer (that was originally in the hallway closet but had been collecting dust in the basement for a while) and then moved the cookbooks to a different cabinet. So much better! Previously, I had been buying food that I already had because I just couldn't find it in my pantry and I was literally just throwing stuff in there where ever I had room. Now I actually have it all organized and hope to keep it that way.

My two new doors. The upper trim on the door on the left fell off so we need to have that reinstalled (and have a talk with our contractor to make sure that his nail gun is working). We obviously need to get some door knobs and I still need to do some caulking on the door frames and then have the doors and all the trim and base molding sprayed (it came pre-primed). The wall paint in the kitchen is the same as the bathroom so that made it easier.

The new microwave and oven. I kinda hate that the oven is right next to the fridge but we just don't have any room to put anything in between with how the oven outlet and microwave is lined up. The microwave is a little bit higher than I would have wanted it to be but it does line up with the cabinets to the side. You can see the horizontal line on the cabinets above where they were cut to make them shorter. I'm hoping to have the cabinets sprayed with the new doors this summer and then put on new hinges and cabinet pulls. You can't really tell how gross-looking my cabinets are from the picture but I think if they are just sanded and repainted, it will do wonders.

My tiny little kitchen. Someday, the wall on the left will be ripped down to open up into the living room and the wall on the right will open up into an addition that will attach to the garage with a half bath, mudroom/laundry room and my kitchen will be huge (or at least larger than it is) with a table that can actually seat more than three people and hopefully more and then we will entertain and have parties and do homeschool lessons around it (haha - yeah right! I would never do homeschool!!). But seriously, I will bake my own bread and jar the peaches from my peach tree and preserve my own salsa and jam because I will have room for it and time since I won't always be doing some project around my house. Someday....