My Dream Kitchen - Part 2

After the Demolition

Thanks for being patient with all the ugly/messy stuff :)  If you missed the previous post with the demolition and all the ugly brown, it's right here.

After all that demolition, we started slowly rebuilding the kitchen.  I had always dreamed of a black and white,  French farmhouse kitchen, unfortunately, there wasn't much original charm there to save, and so we added back as many old-fashioned details as we could, on a budget.  And REALLY on a budget. 

The Beadboard

We started by applying beadboard to the walls.

Gotta love the tell tale sign of my working husband:  The big gulp cup from Circle K!

We were a bit frustrated with the batch of beadboard we bought, it was nice wood, but it was full of holes we had to fill, slowing us down even further.  After we painted it though, it made it look even more 'authentic.'  It matches the old beadboard already in our house on the mudroom ceiling. 

To Drywall or Not, That is the Question

I had this crazy stubborn dislike of drywall at that point.  Partly because I was trying to be an old house purist, and partly because we had an extreme hatred for drywall dust, after having just finished the living room.  We decided to try some wood paneling - yeah, seriously, on the walls, which didn't lay flat or look right, and so our project stalled for a bit. 

At that point, we went through some really hard times.  The months that we were working on this kitchen were really tough.  We were in the middle of a diagnostic process to determine weather or not our son had Autism, I was getting ready to have a baby soon, with some complications and a 'bedrest' prescribed throughout most of my pregnancy, and Eric's father passed away.  We still miss him every day! 

My brother-in-law and a team of good Young Men from our Church came and helped put up drywall in place of the paneling.  It got us off and going again, and we will always be very grateful!

We also had to level out the sagging ceiling in the kitchen too.

Counters and Cabinets

Finally it was time for new cabinets, counters, and a sink!!  Yeah!!  Because we really did this on a budget, we went with IKEA cabinets and products.  I have mixed feelings about that, because the quality really isn't that great, and they defintely are showing their wear after 7 years, but it was the difference between being able to remodel the kitchen or not at that time - and I've been really happy with the way they look.

We chose white 'beadboard' style cabinets.  I was a little worried about beadboard on the walls, and beadboard again in the cabinets - but I guess I can't get enough, cause I really love how it turned out. 

It's the usual mess, but starting to really look new and different.

Our Lovely "Pressed Tin" Ceiling

And here's my favorite part of the whole project.  We purchased a special ceiling paper from Lowe's with an embossed relief in it.  It was inexpensive, but looks so much like pressed tin that no one has been able to tell the difference unless we mention it (which of course, I just did).  This is a wonderful memory for me, we had a family wallpapering party, and took turns working and holding my new
baby :)

I think Alain was about two weeks old here.  Here's his Uncle doing a baby shift :)






We figured wallpaper was easy enough, so the ceiling paper should be too.  Not quite so.  This was heavy paper and we were working against gravity.  I still have this memory of my Mom standing there with a towel-wrapped broom holding the paper up on one end, one person on a ladder in the middle holding it up, and another person on a ladder applying it to the ceiling.  It took three people working against gravity to get that stuff up!

Don't we all look thrilled to have our picture taken?

Here you can see we are applying my lovely black and white kitchen wallpaper.  I should say normally that I'm not a big fan of busy prints - I love nuetral colors and white, but I really wanted a French Country feel in the kitchen, and this really worked out to give it the look I wanted.  So after removing all that wallpaper, we added some right back on! 

The Floor

Then came the flooring, again on a budget, we chose to apply black and white vinyl tiles on a diagonal.

We are getting closer........

 Only one more post, I promise, will be the last of the kitchen series.  It was a project that took us a long time, but the Reveal is comming..........

Capturing a Moment

Not even two, going on twenty! Yep, my baby is growing up way too fast.  I promise I did not pose her for this picture.  I think I might be in trouble though.