The Kitchen - Lighting, Paint, Floors, Appliances

I've been meaning to post the last little installment of our kitchen project but kinda sorta forgot about it.  And then upon seeing that Dorian's Pinisher theme this week was home, I realized one of the inspirations for my kitchen lighting was garnered from Pinterest and it totally counts!  As long as you don't mind if I chatter on about a few other details after, I can once again merit the prestigious title of Pinisher. 

(If you're into home redos and that sort of thing you can see the first kitchen post I did over here with a few posts after that with more specifics.)

So, lighting.  I saw this pin on Pinterest (my pin of it here) and realized we could make that happen in the kitchen above the sink to replace the not so cute fixture that had been hanging there.  It was the simplest thing ever and it was one of those things you really wish you would have thought of without the need of a pin!  We used the chain and ceiling thingy (technical term) from the old fixture and I spray painted them with the brushed nickel paint to match the rest of the kitchen.  We also reused the wiring and socket.  So all we really had to do was cut a hole in the top of a mason jar lid (Brian did that) and put it all together.  We needed to get a smaller bulb as well in order to fit in the lid of the jar.  


Ta-da!  A bit kitschy but I still like it.

(Mary and Jesus totally photobombing this pic.)

See how simple?  


  It's also a bit small for the space but I'm not too bothered by that.  It's certainly better than what was there before and total cost was...FREE!  (Bulb doesn't count, right?)  That makes me happy.

To replace the horrendous four foot long fluorescent light in the ceiling we got this boring fixture:


We did attempt something fancier but decided against it.
Over the eating area where once there was a very tragic and dangerous ceiling fan we (and by we I mean Brian) installed this a few years ago:


From Ebay and super cheap...$20 or something like that.  
As you can see I still need to work on window coverings.  I may attempt to faux sew a Roman shade type of thing.  Or not.  We shall see if Pinterest comes through again.  BUT you can see the new paint in this pic!  Last month I tried a white in here that had the slightest hint of gray (White Diamond by Benjamin Moore matched at Lowe's) and it didn't work.  I wanted an all white kitchen but when it was up it just looked barren.  So two days ago, with that special type of crazy I live with daily, I repainted.  And I made the color myself.  Who does that?  I took the remaining White Diamond and mixed some of this dark green blue that I had gotten from Lowe's off the oops shelf ($5!) and this is what happened!  Not exactly what I was hoping for but I don't know, I think I may sort of like it.

On to flooring.  When we pulled up the linoleum one snowy January morning, this is what we found:
  

We spent many hours pulling out the plywood underneath and the trillions of staples.  Flooring installers are the least secure people I know.  Really, what do you think is going to happen that you need a staple literally every inch throughout the floor?  So there's lots of staple holes but we fancy design folk like to call that "rustic."


Brian took a very long day and I got the boys out of the house (which was also a very very long day) and he sanded them down.  There were a few water spots that just wouldn't budge, unfortunately, but they still looked great after sanding.

Mid staining  

We stained them to match the other room and got pretty darn close considering they are different woods.  However, when we put the stain on a whole bunch of water spots appeared throughout the floor.  Such a bummer but not something we've chosen to be too bothered by.  It's an old old floor and it still looks better than before...just sorta stinks when Brian worked so hard to get it spotless.  


The color is a honey oak.  The floor in the kitchen we believe is oak but the front of the house is all a soft pine (a very very soft pine as the many many many dents and marks can attest).  I like that the medium tone of the floor hides the messes a bit but isn't so dark that every bit of dust shows. 

I thought I'd mention our appliances here as well and put even more details than anyone ever wanted to know about our kitchen into written form.  The appliances we got two years ago for crazy clearance off of Ebay from a local store.  Seriously, like 75% off of these fancy stainless steel higher grade appliances.  Such a blessing.  (Also the fridge that stopped working two days before Luke was born and took two months to get Bosch to honor their warranty and replace .  Remember that?  Remember me having to store all our cold goods on the porch for two months during which time I had a baby?  I laughed about it even then but please honor that entertaining time in our lives and never buy Bosch.  Never ever ever ever.)


The range hood was here but we (again, we as in Brian.  We are one through marriage.) spray painted it.  It doesn't really work but it can serenade your ears with a spa like buzzing noise.

We'd still like to install benches in the eat in area someday and eventually I'll figure out the window coverings but for the most part, you can grab a fork and put it in this kitchen because it is done.  Now onto the basement, windows, laundry, and utility room...because an old house is never really done, now is it?




5 comments

  1. wow! I think it looks very lovely! and love the Cross and Icons! The mason jar kitchen sink light is great! :)

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  2. Love it!! I like the paint color too. I am VERY impressed by the floor!

    How did you find the appliances on EBAY? I never thought to look for them there! We still need to get new appliances . . . that is our last hold out in the kitchen.

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    1. It was kind of crazy. The thought popped into my head one morning because once in a while people will sell big things like that for 'pick-up only' and if they're close to you, you can buy that way. Well, turns out just a few towns over is this place that gets high end scratch and dent appliances from the manufacturer and there were a bunch of auctions ending that day! They also ship but then the price gets much higher. So Brian went and picked them up and we got CRAZY deals. I had to be one of those insane people watching and bidding at literally the last second but well worth it! I meant to put the link up from the original post (not that it gives a ton of detail, though) http://www.betterthaneden.com/2011/08/spoiled.html

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  3. WOW Mary! Amazing. I love everything about this... the wall color is great. High fives to you and Brian!:)

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  4. I am SO impressed! The floors look fabulous, as do the lighting fixtures, and the paint, and the appliances - a beautiful kitchen! Way to go!

    I never knew that about eBay....going to have to start doing some saved searches.

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