Quick Kitchen Light Update

This project took 2 hours from start to finish and it has turned me to the darkside! I want to spray paint e-v-e-r-ything now.

Here are some before shots of my kitchen light fixture..





First I took everything apart..



And taped off anything I didn't want to get paint on..




Here is the amazing product I used! Its 'Oil Rubbed Bronze' from krylon. I picked up two cans at Wal-Mart for $3.97each. It's awsome!



Definatly spray paint outside with large enough piece of carboard for your project! My poor poor grass got a nice new ORB finish aswell.. :(




And here is how it looks now. I have a few touch up areas I need to address but for now I like the results! What do you think?










Total cost? $8.33 plus 2hours of time. Not bad eh?



And a quick suprise.. our neice Emily had a present for us..



Flowers! Isn't she sweet? Love love love that little girl.

And you thought we were going to stick with the retro lino..

First of all, you'll notice a diffrent color on the walls..



My friend here is a painter! I am lucky to have her because I am a terrible painter. There aren't many things Thomas isn't good at.. but.. lets just say lightly.. painting is not his forte. We were so thankful for the extra help and to have an expert around!

We chose the Aurora brand from Benjamin Moore. This is an amazing paint + primer in one. Personally I haven't used other brands like Behr, but based on the research and reviews I've read its not very good. BM's Aurora was expensive but we didn't have to prime so that made it okay. Its also low VOC and thats really important to us. The BLUE kitchen of mine had me a little worried but this paint got the job done in ONE COAT.

In the kitchen we painted Benjamin Moore's Baffin Island..



And the living room got a facelift with Benjamin Moore's Seaspray..



Okay so after we painted the walls we had to wait for the ceiling to finish up (sand,sand,paint,stamp)so that slowed us down a little but as soon as it was finished production sped up 10fold!




The flooring we bought is a Costco special. It was a great deal and THICK at 14mm. It's laminate so installation wasnt as difficult as a hardwood. Thomas installed all 500ish SqFT himself and made it look easy breezy. We decided to leave the bedrooms carpet for now and just install the laminate in the kitchen, living room, and hallway.




Hey Wendee.. this wasn't planned you know.. but I'm glad your gift got in the picture! I love them! :)

Please disregard my messy closet! I've warned you.. now onto the hallway ch-ch-changes..

Before



After



Alrighty. That concludes the floor update. Next we have to finish installing baseboards..



Do you know how hard it is to chose a baseboard style? Which one do you like best here?

Goodbye Lino, Goodbye carpet

Remember when I gave a small subtle hint about our floors? Well heres a bit of detail!


The start of a very messy situation..



The plywood and lino were pried up. Why? The floors are now even throughout the living room and hallway for the NEW floors to go in..



What we discovered under it all.. Why would you ever want to replace this beautiful even OLDER lino.. I just can't even imagine...







And here is the ritual known to all men.. Stand back, look, and enjoy the work you have just done.





The carpet really didn't seem all that bad.. until we ripped them up and discovered the grung. Yuck! Adios!







From floor to ceiling, this house is getting a makeova! *hinthinthint*

New Kitchen Hardware

I was looking for a quick DIY fix so I decided to get diffrent hardware for my cupboards. The old hardware was white, plastic, and silver boringness. We found all of our new stainless steal chicy hardware at home depot and cost us $116.00 plus a box of $2.99 screws. All of the drawers got pulls instead of knobs so it required a little measuring to drill an extra hole in each panel but in the end, totally worth it! Here are some pictures!


Old Blah Hardware





Hard at work


New and Improved