Joyful Family Life: Kitchen Remodel Update

As I've mentioned before, we are remodeling our home's kitchen and back family room. What a learning process! The goal for the remodel is to remove all the 1980s memorabilia and update our home into a clean, white, traditional look. This includes lots of painting, wood trim changes, cabinet upgrades, and flooring changes. The family room is still in pieces, but our kitchen is finally coming together! After some setbacks, design changes, and many trips around town, I can see the light at the end of the kitchen remodel tunnel. Whew!

This was the kitchen when we first toured our home in 2010 (the picture date is incorrect.) Within three days after moving in, we had ripped out those upper left cabinets to open up the room, and the florescent light box came out quickly as well. But the rest of the room stayed the same until a few months ago.

I painted the walls in October, and some of the window trim was painted white. Then morning sickness took its toll, and the remodeling stopped for a few months. This fourth baby really socked it to me! Once I was feeling better, I convinced Johnny to crank out the rest of the remodel before the baby's due date in August.

First on the list was to replace and paint the upper cabinets. We swapped the laundry room and kitchen cabinets, so the larger cabinets moved into the kitchen. After countless coats of paint and sealer, we finally hung the shiny, white cabinets in the kitchen. We added crown molding and custom trim around the cabinet and raised it all the way to the ceiling. Luckily we had my brother and brother-in-law to help with these cabinet installs. Being pregnant, I am not much help in the weight lifting department.

Next, the cabinet doors got painted with a million coats of paint and sealer. I wanted them to be bullet proof against splatters and stains. I used Varathane's Polyurethane Crystal Clear sealer on all the cabinets. While I painted in the garage, Johnny built the new breakfast bar. Then we installed the new range. (I love that my husband is a talented guy!) The breakfast bar will eventually get a wooden countertop, which Johnny will also make himself. All those woodworking YouTube videos he watches are coming in handy!

One amazing benefit to a pier and beam foundation is the ability to crawl under the house to move pipes and wires. Johnny had to run a new power line to the breaker box and cut new holes for the downdraft range. It took over a week for a new range to finally get installed, but we sure love it!

Then it was time for paint colors. After painting three shades of green on the cabinets, we decided to paint the middle shade. Our friends and family members that weighed in on the choice also picked the middle color. First, I cleaned off decades of kitchen gunk and then sanded down the cabinets. Amazingly, my kids watched cartoons and played during all this work. I love my kids!

The base cabinets only needed two coats of green paint. We then added 5-6 coats of sealer to make them bulletproof against splatters and spills. I painted during the baby's nap time, while my older kids watched cartoons. (Yes, there were lots of cartoons watched during this time!) With all that wet paint, it's a miracle that we only had one kid hand print mishap, which was easily fixed. All three kids were amazing at staying out the kitchen for a few days to let everything fully cure.

All the painting in the kitchen is finally (sort of) done. Johnny still needs to build a pantry to replace the existing cabinet housing the old microwave and oven, but in the meantime we were ready to replace our kitchen countertops. The kids and I drove all over North Austin visiting slab yards, trying to find that perfect hunk of granite. The kids enjoyed walking through "the big stones" and seeing the forklifts move the slabs around. Finally, I narrowed down some favorites.

I almost majored in Geology during college, so I love rocks. I knew I would fall in love with a more expensive hunk of granite, simply because the coolest looking slabs are pricey. So, I narrowed down an option in three different price categories before Johnny came to look at the slabs.

We chose the White Galaxy granite, and I am so excited to see that white streak run along our kitchen counters. A week later, the kids and I took a trip to Amarillo to see my little sister graduate from high school. While we were gone, Johnny ripped out the existing countertops so the granite installers could form their cutting template. He also added Sheetrock to the inside of the breakfast bar and ripped out the microwave/oven unit and cabinets.

Life with no countertops and no kitchen sink has been memorable. I'm glad today is the final day! Johnny went all week washing dishes in the bathroom while the kids and I were on vacation, so all five of us only had to survive the weekend together. Lots of paper plates and disposable spoons later (sorry Earth) we are excited to see the return of the countertops today!

Here is our granite template. The installers should be arriving this afternoon, and I can't wait to see the stone in our kitchen! A new sink and new faucet will be installed as well.