Kitchen Cabinets!

So here we go. Here is the story of how we refinished our kitchen cabinets. If you don't care just scroll down to the bottom and you can see the "after" pictures.

Here is the before: Lots of wood paneling and darkness going on.

We took everything out of the cupboards and I realized that I have creepy old-cabin cupboards.

So after sanding we got to work priming the interior. There are lots of surfaces in cupboards. There may have been some cursing at this point. I don't know, Shawn was talking under his breath.

Such a happy helper.

The cabinets are all done here. We let them cure for 3 days. We used oil based paint because it is more durable. I tell you I will never take latex paint for granted again. Oil paint is a bear to work with. Two weeks later and I still have paint on my arms. But I can clean my cabinets all they want and that paint is not coming off.

One coat of primer, 2 coats of paint, and 3 days to cure later. . . we put everything back in the cupboards. Hooray! No more making toast on a cutting board by the front door. It was the only plug I could find.


Here are all the cabinet fronts sitting out in the garage. Now here is a story just so you feel bad for me. Each cabinet door is a little different. The grooves on the front of the door line up with each other, so each door has to go back where it came off of. There are 32 cabinet doors. We had to make a map of what door went where. They were laid out in specific order. I was the only one that was allowed to move a door for any reason. Remarkably, we were able to keep them all in order.
After: Ahhhhh! I love it! We spray painted all the hardware (handles, hinges, even the screws) with a metallic brushed bronze spray paint. I antiqued the doors by sanding the edges and grooves then wiping them down with a glaze. I am really happy with the outcome.
Next we will replace the counter tops and get a new floor and paint the walls. By "next" I mean in the year ahead when we get the $$.

If anyone is interested, here are some great tutorials I read over and over to help me out.

Starter Home to Dream Home blog
Recaptured Charm-glazing
Nora's blog

Some advice:
Don't go into this thinking it will be a weekend job. This took me 2 1/2 weeks of intense work. I spent on average 6-8 hours a day on this. We did take weekends off to let the paint cure. My dad also helped out almost every day for hours, and Shawn helped out too (I have awesome liners in all my cupboards thanks to him. Thanks baby!)

Use oil-based paint. It was a pain but I am not afraid to abuse the cabinets a little. They get lots of abuse anyway. That paint is on there!

Pick one pair of clothes to ruin. I wasn't thinking the first day and was wearing my favorite running pants when I started. Now they are my favorite painting pants.

Find some suckers to help you. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU Shawn and Dad. I cannot thank you enough. I would still be sitting on my kitchen floor crying if is wasn't for all the help these two fantastic guys gave me.

Hope you like it! Now I am off to Mexico. Adios!