BEFORE PICTURES Top is the left wall that the stove is against. The dirtiest, greasiest wall in the kitchen. Bottom picture is of the main wall. The right hand wall has a free standing cabinet used as a pantry and the side by side refrigerator.
After several large, ugly spider appearances within a day or two I decided it was high time to bug bomb the house. I had been needing to go visit my Aunty for a while. So I decided to bomb the house last Sunday. While the bombs were killing all them bad spiders I would take the dogs and go visit my Aunty.
Of course when you bug bomb your house you either pack up your dishes beforehand or wash them later. Because of my time frame I chose to wash later. I also figured as ALL the kitchen cabinets needed to be cleaned this would be a great opportunity! And of course while I'm cleaning cabinets and dishes I can sort, discard and re-organize everything to my little heart's content, right?
Then I thought that while I'm cleaning stuff I might as well clean the WHOLE kitchen. Parts haven't been cleaned in over eight years. Needless to say this was was way overdue and a long time coming.
And then....well since everything is already clean I might as well repaint and save myself some cleaning prep work later right???
So this week with the help of my niece I have scrubbed the two walls & cabinets shown above with TSP, spackled the holes and caulked the cracks and crevices. I have applied two coats of Killz paint/primer on the two wall shown above and the cabinet above the stove.
We also pulled the dishes out of two other upper cabinets and washed them. I discarded over a dozen mugs, an extra meat platter and a set of serving bowls. I kept the newer serving bowls and two older, vintage Pyrex(?) bowls. These items went to my sister-inlaw, so no I didn't just throw them away. Family will get first pick, leftovers will be donated to a thrift store. Unfortunately I will have to re-pull the dishes to remove the shelves for heavier cleaning. They have been wiped clean BUT they still don't look clean. :( So I will be scouring them a little bit later. Maybe while that ceiling is drying that I'm going to go paint here in a few minutes!
Later I plan to change the mis-matched golden oak & ??? cabinets to a mahogony/cherry color. This is a project for another payday. Ditto the hardware I plan to replace-all the cabinet knobs, drawer pulls and outside mounted hinges. I have mismatched cabinets, four different styles.... The lower ones on the front wall are original as far as I know. The uppers were made to my my mom's wishes and are "new" and modern. The one above the stove is a "make-do" from another house. Then there is one more set of lowers fronted with plywood & cut-out plywood doors. These are being painted like the "make-do" cabinet.
As I'm "re-decorating" I am trying to recreate the feeling of Arts & Crafts style in a manner pleasing to me and my limited budget.
.
