Ugly Duckling--Pretty Swan

I was going to say this picture doesn't do our "before" kitchen justice, but that could be misconstrued. What I intend to say is that this picture does our "before" kitchen far, far too much justice. In it, you cannot see the rusty, disgusting sink, or painted shut lower cupboards I was too afraid to ever open. You can see some of what made us so glad to say goodbye to this kitchen--the awesome penetentiary-inspired light fixture above the sink, a glimpse of the snaggle-toothed, broken tiles below it, the cupboards that wouldn't close all the way...

Annnd, here below is the sink in all its glory. This was actually after we began peeling off layer after layer of contact paper. You can make out the lime green and faux wood layers still... Though we later sanded and tried to recoat it, it resisted all efforts. For 3 years, we just didn't put anything in it (understandably),which was tough when you don't have a dishwasher for most of that time. We did get a little countertop one later that helped keep me sane.


And here is our tide-over kitchen. Less hideous contact paper, but the health code violations are the same, I'm sure, no matter how I bleached. And yes, that's carpet on the floor. It was wayyy better than the vinyl "flooring" that had been in there since the seventies. At least we felt okay about being barefoot on the carpet.


Just for good measure, I'm throwing in a photo of what the floor in the dining room (and much of the house) looked like before we scraped an inch of crud off it and refinished it.


And now..... Drum roll, please. Here is our brand spanking new kitchen!! It's quite color-neutral for house-selling purposes, but it's so wonderful nonetheless. We still have to install the tile backsplash (that's backer board you see there), finish spackling and painting, and put up a bar for s-hooks on the wall by the door, but otherwise, it's fully functional in all its garbage disposally, dish-washery GLORY. Whee!!

This is the mudroom, which is through the door to the right (counter piled with ikea shelving). Our fridge is in one corner, and this is the workspace on the other side. It's got so much freaking storage I'm not sure what to do with all of it. We still need to spackle and paint in here, but it's not an emergency.


I now LOVE walking into our kitchen. LOVE. IT. Sometimes I even squeak because I'm so excited it's there.