Kitchen - Before & After

So, waaaaay back before I started reading blogs and realized you should take lots of pictures when undertaking a home improvement project we decided the kitchen needed some help. This post will be heavy on words and light on photos.

When we bought our home 8 years ago it still had the Harvest Gold range.  Granted, it was in pristine condition. I don't think it had ever been used in its 20+  year life. But 1980's Harvest Gold was not going to work for us (Although it seems to be making a come back. I found out recently that someone sold theirs for over $1,000.00!) so one of our first purchases was a new range. We (meaning Mr. B) did spray paint the matching range hood with bisque appliance spray paint.

I could live with the, let's call them vintage shall we, goldish Formica countertops.  They were in great shape and the cost to replace them was not in our budget.

Now, the dark oak cabinets were a whole other story.  Man did they drag the whole room down! Even on the sunniest day I'd have to have all of the lights on just to see the controls on the range. We looked in to refacing but this kitchen is not short on cabinet and drawer fronts!  I think Mr. B is still trying to catch his breath from seeing that quote!
(If you look real hard you can see me standing in front of the stove.  
Just kidding lol!)

After much hemming and hawing and researching, we decided we could and we would paint the doors and drawers until we could afford a full kitchen reno.
(Check out the floor tile!  That used to be dark and somewhat sticky oak parquet. 
What a job that was to take up!  Mr. B laid all of the tile himself in the kitchen and into the eating area!)

I liked the idea of white to brighten up the room but didn't want it to feel to...oh...institutional, y'know? So we agreed upon a color called Queen Anne Lace from Lowes.

Mr. B added the bead board on the front of the return as well as on the side of the pantry.  It mimics the fronts of the cabinets so well.  He also added the molding on the return and painted it bright white to make it look more like a piece of furniture.

As amazing as it looks in the photo, it looks so much better in real life.  The lighter cabinets have really toned down the gold in the countertops and has just brighten everything up dramatically!  

I still love, to this day, the simple pewter knobs we chose.

This was all done 3 or 4 years ago and I still haven't decided on a paint color for the walls!  

Suggestions happily accepted.

 I enjoy cooking in, what to me is, my new kitchen so much! With very little cost and a few weeks of DIY labor we turned this out-dated nightmare into our dream!