The kitchen took a long time, but today’s post is just about one aspect – the cabinets.

The kitchen has some potential. The appliances are almost all new(er), the floor and the backsplash are ceramic tile. The layout isn’t great, but it doesn’t completely suck. BUT if there was one thing that I did not like about this house when we looked at it, it was the kitchen cabinets. Two words: Honey Oak. Bleeech.  Okay, that’s three words, but I really don’t like honey oak.  I wanted cherry.  So I decided I was going to refinish them.   Oh, and the drawers were all messed up.  Fortunately, one of my work friends has a whole wood shop and helped me out with fixing them.

I had to decide how I wanted to do the color. I could do the traditional strip/stain/poly route, I could do a gel stain that would take forever to dry, or I could do this other thing that I found. I was surfing the web and stumbled upon Rustoleum Cabinet Transformations.  Two coats, a glaze and a top coat. I could handle that.

I bought the kit, read the instructions, pulled everything apart, set everything out, and got started.

The hardware was brassy and had to go. I picked brushed nickel knobs to go in their place, so I had to fill the top holes in each door. Then came the “deglossing” phase.  And that’s where I jacked up my hand.  Ouch.  So that put me a few days behind, you know?  But finally, with the help of some latex gloves for the borked hand, I got back to work.

These are with one coat of color:

(and yes, we do know that the under sink area is disgusting. We still are figuring out how we’re going to fix that, because contact paper by itself will not cut it)

I will be honest, at this point, I was skeptical. The color was weird and streaky and it wasn’t quite as thick as I was expecting and I think I was hoping for better coverage with one coat.  Fortunately, it got better with the second coat.

The kit comes with a “decorative glaze” that’s optional. I tried it on the back of one door and decided that it gave the color a nice depth, so then that meant I had to do ALL of the doors.  I’ll be honest, at that point, I was tired of coating everything, drying, flipping and coating again.

And then there was a top coat. It’s the consistency of Elmer’s glue, and smells about the same. It also didn’t dry as neatly as I was expecting, so I have some touch ups to do.

The hinges were fully functional, so I spray painted them to match the knobs I bought (spray paint is awesome).  I put my fun new cordless drill back into use to put everything back together and got this:

The color is way prettier in natural light, but by the time I finished it all, I was down to overhead florescent.  It really brings out the color of the counter (a kind of greenish gray) and goes well with the tile backsplash. Also, you’ll notice the horrible ivy border is gone, because we’re painting this all one nice color.

I’d have to say that overall, I’m pretty satisfied with how they turned out. You can still see the wood grain under the color.  There are a few spots I have left to fix, but they’re overall good to go!

Ladies and Gentlemen, may I introduce the master bedroom.  Pretty standard stuff. Same Peachy Beige Blandness on the walls, some ratty mini blinds, and a boob light. Here’s the view from the hallway door:

Here’s the view from the bathroom:

The light switch had a fan control on it, and one of the things we dislike about the apartment is that the ceiling fan is in the living room and not above the bed.  So obviously, we were going to add a fan.

The biggest argument we had was about the color. I wanted a light green or blue. He didn’t. So we went and stared at paint chips for a while. After a bunch of back and forth rejections, he picked one out, and went “what about this one?” “REALLY?” “What, you don’t like it?” “Yeah, I like it, I just didn’t figure it would be something YOU’D like.”    We bought it, went home and two coats later, we have this:

I believe the color is called Jekyll San Souci (WTF???), but I refer to it as Pool Table Green.  I love it.

Also note the kickass new fan. The blades are the same cherry color as our bedroom set, and when it spins it looks like katanas whirling.  Dangerous but awesome.

We are super happy with the way this turned out.  Since I took these pictures, we put up some 2 inch plantation blinds in the window, which add a lot to the look.  I can’t wait to sleep in here!

One of the simplest changes in our whole Redo has been in the foyer. It’s a perfectly fine foyer, just kind of…blah.  It is our intent to change the door eventually (check the blown weatherstripping in the door windows), but it’s not terrible as it is.   The walls are the same peachy neutral that the contractors painted every other wall in the house.  However, we are not really used to sidelights and would prefer something more private. And the wooden switch plates? HAVE TO GO.

While we were looking at window film for the bathroom, I noticed these Sidelight Solutions on the next shelf down and decided we’d give them a try.

First, let me say that the ordinary window film was super easy to put on the bathroom window (you’ll see that eventually). Unfortunately, these did not cooperate as well.  Same company, same application process, but these did not want to stick. It seemed like the sidelight film didn’t have as much or had crappier adhesive on it than the stuff we put on the bathroom window. I wound up having to actually tape theedges down until it cured.  Lame.

The end result though, is pretty cool:

I am a sucker for stained glass.  It even looks cool from the outside!

And did you catch the chandelier?  I think it’s pretty cool looking.  That’s going to stay.

One area marked as DONE!