It’s been such a busy week of painting, packing, moving…sweating. My primary focus for the past week has been to keep my sanity in any way possible. That means that last night, I finished “working” at 7PM, sat on the sofa, and watched 4 hours of reality TV. I stayed up way past my bedtime, solely because I was suffering from reality TV withdrawal. It’s a problem.
We survived the move, and now we’re just trying to get the last odds and ends moved out of the old condo and into the new house. We have weekend plans for the rest of the month (including a housewarming party!), so I’m going to have to find the motivation to get all of the unpacking done throughout the week. In addition to working my regular job. In addition to getting back on a workout schedule. In addition to maintaining my sanity.
Oy.
So, throughout this post, just keep in mind that this is the adorable remodeled kitchen that I left back at my condo:
And, because I think you might care, here are some progress photos of my new kitchen (which is not finished, and likely won’t be finished before the party)…
Oy.
Can you believe that people PURPOSELY glued this monstrosity to their walls?
This wall also had wallpaper on it–this is what it looked like after taking 1/2 of it off. Did you know that newer wallpaper is kind of two-layered? I didn’t either, until I started trying to remove 2 walls of it! That brownish layer of stuff on the right side of the wall is the 2nd layer of paper/glue. All I did is sprayed it down with some warm water, and it scraped right off with a putty knife.
This is what it looked like with all of the wallpaper removed. The wall definitely needed some spackle, but it cleaned up fairly well. I was surprised to find that there used to be a different window on that wall, and not too happy about having to try to hide the terrible patch job that was done to close it in!
This is a view taken from the middle of the living room. I still love how the kitchen opens up so nicely into the living room. Don’t you love the blue carpet?
This is what the wall in that first picture looked like after the wallpaper was removed and it was painted with 2 coats of Olympic’s Zero VOC ‘Brown Clay’. The pictures aren’t great because they were taken with my iPhone, but the color is pretty true to this picture. Luckily, I’ve located my big girl camera, so future pictures should be much prettier.
Here’s the main wall after 2 coats. It looks a little ‘pumpkin’ in this picture, but it’s not in real life.
You may have missed it in the first picture (because it has a very “cavernous” effect), but residing around the perimeter of the kitchen above the cabinets is about a 12″ high section of faux brick panel. It’s not actually faux brick…it’s real brick, but only in that the manufacturer decided to cut 1/4″ slabs of brick (brick “slices”), and mount them onto a wood panel.
Genius?
Not really.
I’m not super crazy about the brick itself, but rather than ripping it down right now, I decided to just paint it. Now that I’ve started to paint it white(ish), I actually like the way that it adds a little bit of texture to the space.
I’m still debating whether I’d like to paint the trim a different color, or maybe I’ll paint the “brick” a different color in the future. The beauty is that it’s my house, and I can.
This is the main kitchen wall, after painting the window trim and the trim that goes around the doorway. In the future, I plan to switch out the doorway trim–partially because I think that it could look better, and partially because the ceiling is sagging a bit and I’m concerned.
As a side note, I’ve been trying to convince Rick that we need to remove that door that you see next to the refrigerator. That is actually the door that leads to our dining room, which was built as an addition to the house. Since that door used to lead to the back yard, it still remains, but really serves no purpose.
My safety-first police officer husband is convinced that the door adds extra security should someone ever try to break in. However, I’ve never left that door closed unless I was painting the wall or brick behind it. To me, it’s pointless, and detracts from the space that I’d like to use for a 2-seater pub table!
What do you think? Should we remove the door, or leave it?
In the future, I’ll also be painting the trim around the living room window that shares the wall with the kitchen. I’m really not a fan of wood-colored trim, so it’s likely that all of the trim in the house will be updated to a more chipper color.
This is a little better picture of the partially-painted brick, and you can also see the 2 drawer faces that I’ve already refinished! I’m so excited about my cabinet refinishing project, because I think that it’s going to make a HUGE difference in the way the whole room looks.
The plan is to finish the cabinet project after I’ve finished the remainder of the brick and trim painting. At my current rate, I should have the cabinets finished by around Christmas…in which case, I’ll have to do the cabinets first, because they’re messy and need to be done outside (and I won’t be staining cabinets in the driveway wearing snow boots).
When it comes down to it, I’m really excited about everything we have going on, and I’m happy with the way that the kitchen is turning out…but, there is a lot of work left to do. I’m feeling a little overwhelmed, since now I also have to worry about unpacking in addition to remodeling. I will just continue reminding myself that we have a lifetime to live in this house, and it will not be “perfect” overnight. That’s OK.
I love it anyway.
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