I’m waist deep in renovating my kitchen.  Lawwwwwd, HALP ME survive popcorn for dinner every night.

Guess what?!  Wait for it, waiiiiiiiiiiit for it…. I’m sharing all my insider designer secrets//the whole shebang with you along the way in a new kitchen series.

 

Does the thought of gutting your kitchen make you want to plunge your entire head into a sink of cold grimy water?  I’m a massive sissy, so that would send me running for the hills.

 

But kitchen reno.   I love this shit.  Who knew?   W.e.i.r.d.o.

 

I want to show you how to NOT stick your head in an oven while renovating your kitchen.

PS. This is actually the old kitchen.  I know, right?  It actually will get better.    Holy batman.  Yay!

 

 

Plug your ears and cover your eye holes.  You will absolutely freak your face.  This series is going to get wild and super fugly at times.  It’s worth it. With this series, you’ll have an arsenal of ideas to help ease your kitchen into d’bomb diggity ville of awesomeness.

 

Hot dawg!!!    It’s good stuff.   Are you ready for it??

Let’s get this hot mess kitchen renovation started.

 

Planning your kitchen

 

Of course, I saved about 43158457690572 photos on a kitchen inspiration board on Pinterest <– a place where kitchens are viewed through rose coloured glasses.

Not gunna lie, sometimes Pinterest makes me freak out.  I full frontal smooch it and hate it, all at once.  Inspired?  Overwhelmed?  Yeah, I hear ya sista.  Beware.

 

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Dream kitchens do not come riding in on unicorns.  If they did, the unicorn should carry a martini flask in its saddle bag. Just sayin’

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What have I learned about planning a kitchen renovation?  Whatever you do, get your life and ever loving soul into the whole idea of renovation and just go balls to the walls.

 

Did.I.Just.Say.That??!!

 

Just do.  Some things can be done in baby steps, and some things…. well.. need to go back to the studs.  I like how I just talked about studs in my kitchen.  This could be going somewhere.  Hmphfff.  Back to the kitchen.

 

 

When do you start??

I waited and waited and waited for the time to be just right.  A time when the moon and stars above would be aligned. Possibly even a full lunar eclipse and a shooting star for good measure.

That perfect time never happened.

What the what what?

 

Truth is, I took a whole lotta baby steps over the years before I decided to take my kitchen back to the studs.  For the record, I just wanted to say stud again.

One of my biggest changes over the years was transitioning to white.  I painted white, all the live long day.  If it didn’t move, it was getting painted white.

 

Just. White.Everything.

 

 

If you can believe it, the kitchen was wayyyyyy ugly, way back when. You can see the original kitchen here.  Prepare to hide your eyes.   It’ll hurt your eyeballs.

Sit down and just gather yourself together for this part.  Perhaps pour a stiff drink.  Definitely.  Pour a stiff drink.

 

 

Before. After. Messy Middle.

My baby steps, in hindsight, don’t even look like baby steps over the 14 year kitchen journey but they freaking were.   A little here. A little there.  Gah.  You’ll see why in a sec.

The kitchen last week :

 

The kitchen about 10 years ago.  Sorry if this photo makes you want to barf.

 

 

Did I just scare you? Yeah.  Me too.   It was funky town in there. Need a barf bucket?

 

 

What did I learn in the process of kitchen renovations over the years?

 

Note to self:  

Money does not, in fact, grow on trees.

 What a rip.

 

Improved a bit, right?  haha.   Hellooooooo white paint.  I love you.  My entire house is actually painted head to toe with Benjamin Moore paint.    So therefore, the new kitchen… will be …you guessed it…

 

 

Simply white just makes me want to back flip across my kitchen floor.  Well, in my head, anyway.  Does that count?

The kitchen became a pretty place over the last many years with the help of white paint.

Here is what it looked like a couple of weeks ago:

 

Ikea slipcovered sofas /  Leon’s Laurel chairs /  Shell Lighting  / Pendant Lighting / Faucets

Back to scary mode.  Now, the kitchen looks like this….

 

 

Uhm. Yeah.  It actually looks worse than that.  I was just easing you into the disaster.

 

 Meal Planning:

 

I’m in full swing kitchen renovation mode, and there’s no stopping me, people.  The only thing I stop for are sawdust sandwiches and sugar paralysis on a plate donuts.

 

This was the overall layout :

 

 

Then someone (who did that?!!) came along with a sledge hammer and did this to my kitchen *HALP*

 

I know, right?

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Popcorn for dinner! Oh I’m just kidding. Popcorn and sawdust for dinner!  Seriously kidding, you guys.  Popcorn and sawdust and martinis for dinner!

#TheStruggleIsReal

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Let’s do this again.  For a sec.

 

 

Then wham.  Gone.

 

 

And you wonder why I eat popcorn for dinner.  Popcorn for the win.

 

Bun in the oven  

The wood burning  stove.  It has kept us warm through winter storms, and it somehow magically bakes bread in an ever-loving-save-my-soul-with-deliciousness-kind-of-way.  I’ve never claimed to be domestic, but dammit I have my moments.  ?

 

 

Get floored:

As pretty as the floors look in the photo below, we did install them 14 years ago and they are now, super freaking difficult to remove.  They are like a rubik’s cube, or a super intense puzzle.  I can’t handle it.   Also, the floors just don’t match the rest of the reclaimed flooring in the rest of the house.

We are going to go right over top of the flooring with new, BUT OLD flooring.  What?  Yes.

Don’t throw virtual darts at me.   I pinky swear promise you’ll love the end result and I’m not even crossing my fingers behind my back this time.

Can we stop talking about the floors now?

 

 

 

 

 

 

The barn board flooring is even in the treehouse.  I’m smitten with it.  Can you tell?  Seriously.  Sofa king, good.

 

The gathering hub 

Our kitchen is (was?) the gathering hub of our home. Our four kids, our friends, their friends, friends of friends, strangers… kidding.  Not kidding.  We all gather here.

After all that gathering, we ( ME!!)  discovered our kitchen flaws along the way too.

 

 

 

 

Let’s talk about my flaws.

Kitchen flaws.

Yo, I’m perfect, peeps. <– perfectly imperfect in all non perfectionist ways.  Totally flawed.

But still.

Where were we?

Kitchen.  Flaws.  Gotcha.

 

I made a big mistake when I decided to put the refrigerator beside the stove.  Dumb. Dumb. Stoopid.

 

 

It was like playing twister with your fridge and stove.  A human booby-trap.  We could never open the oven and refrigerator at the same time without having to have some sort of explosion.  The explosion was me screaming…. don’t effffffffing scratch the fridge door with the stove door!!!!!!!%$##@##@!@!

Needless to say, I lost the battle.  My refrigerator looks like the barn cats have danced on it since 1982.

Never doing that again.

I lived.  I learned.

Well.  Maybe not.

 

 

I made more mistakes.

Like agreeing to do dishes all the time.  Big mistake.  Until we bought a Miele dishwasher.  Helloooooooo.  Hark, can you hear the angels singing? I freaking love that dishwasher.

I want to put a ring on it.

 

 

I have a sinking feeling 

Guess what?  More mistakes.  Can I start blaming them on someone else now?   We (me and the mouse in my pocket) wanted a larger, farmhouse style sink.  Blah. Blah. Blah.

The new sink ended up hugging the dishwasher a leeeeeetle too close.  Only I am allowed to hug the dishwasher.

Whatup wit dat?  The ding dong bell was just rung.

 

 

I feel like this is a pretty woman moment.  “Mistake. Big mistake”… as I toddle outta my kitchen, clicking my fingers in a Z formation.

 

 

Do you have kitchen flaws that make you want to reach into your desk drawer and guzzle that flask of vodka?  What? You don’t have a desk?  Oh don’t look at me like that.  Uhm. Vodka for the win.  Vodka = awesome water

 

That’s what I’m having for dinner tonight.  Kidding.  I’m having vodka and popcorn.

I’m exhausted from talking about my mistakes.  See you on the other side, batman.

Up next… Part Two: The New Kitchen Plan.  Stay tuned.  It’ll rock your world.

 

Talk to me.  What’s your kitchen look like? What do you want to improve?  Want to do small improvements or meet your studs?  Hmmm.

Are you still thinking about studs?  My fault.  Your problem.  haha.

 

 

SHOP my kitchen faves :