Kitchen update

A few months ago, I decided that I was sick of our kitchen. I had been living with it for almost eight years. It had a drop ceiling and dark walnut cabinets that were yucky, probably because I didn't do spring cleaning often enough. See what I mean? Don't you love the combination of faux butcher block, dark walnut and those antique brass knobs that have long been tarnished? In this picture, the drop ceiling is already gone, a July 4th project Eric completed.

Our budget is pretty tight right now, so we decided to paint the cabinets instead of re-covering them. Last night, after working for three weeks with a vacation break and other distractions, I finished painting a section of cabinets. This is what they look like:

I will work on the rest of the cabinets in five different groups to minimize problems with matching the doors and to minimize the amount of stuff we have to store on the table. And then there will be the big job of painting the walls, removing some useless decorative shelving, painting the windows, putting up curtains and replacing blinds. We will also probably recover the counters to match the new color scheme. One of our friends said he has the cutting tools to do it. It will probably be Christmas before we are done with the kitchen, but it will feel like a new kitchen. It also feels good to know that instead of just chucking old stuff, we are re-using and refurbishing perfectly good materials to make them beautiful.