I am so excited to share my recent week worth of hard work. We moved into our condo over three years ago with the statement of “oh, we can change the kitchen.” Welp, life changed for us and there has been no budget to redo the kitchen. I’ve dreamed up my kitchen, I’ve pinned a million inspiration photos, but couldn’t make it happen. Finally I had to stop thinking like a designer and think like a broke homeowner, ha! But seriously, I needed to design within my means to get me through the next few years or more while living with the kitchen we have. So, what did I do? I ventured onto Pinterest and read many, many tutorials that other ladies, like myself, have done to their kitchens. My favorite one and the one I chose to follow was from Our Vintage Home Love.
I gathered myself and wrote out a schedule that I knew I would stick to. It so happened that my husband was leaving on an 8 day surf trip so I felt that would be the perfect time to paint the kitchen. I knew that for the best results I needed to allow 24 hours for each coat to dry before I applied the next one. With knowing this, if I started on Tuesday my last coat would be done Friday morning and then the kitchen could dry all weekend while the kids and I took a quick Easter trip to the desert. While the kids were at school I got to work.
First step was to clean clean clean my counters and back splash really well with soap and water. (Sad to admit this was probably the first time I had done a good scrubbin on these ugly tiles)
Feast your eyes on these horrible, brown and gold 80’s tiles. Can you believe I’ve lived with these for 3 years?! Hence me never sharing my kitchen on my Instagram. This little kitchen of mine felt like a cave! It’s at the back of our home so it doesn’t have a window other than the cut out to the family room and then the window off the office nook. It always just felt so dark and dreary…my excuse for not liking to cook.
I had bought all my supplies and wanted to share them with you because I truly hope this inspires one of you to try this too. Make yourself happy and get that white kitchen you’ve always wanted.
Supply list:
paint trays (again a new one for each day)
plastic to protect floors and appliances when needed
paint brush cleaner for the oil-based paints
and I used an on hand small paint brush for around my sink
Painters mask (it is stinky)
After scrubbing my tiles clean I let them dry overnight, so I cleaned them Monday night. Tuesday I did my primer coat. I found that with my grout being so deep and large it was best if I used an 1″ paint brush to paint the grout. I did this in small 18″ sq. sections starting with the back splash. Once I painted that section of grout I’d then go over that section with the 6″ roller covering the tiles and also smoothing out the paint that went onto the tiles from painting the grout. I did the back splash first so that any paint I dripped onto the counters I could then go over and smooth out after the backs splash was done. The primer coat took about 3 hours to complete because of my grout and the texture of my tiles. I let this coat dry until the next morning. The slow part was painting around my sink. The edge of my below counter sink has the grout exposed so I had to use a small craft paint brush to paint the grout, as well as the small back splash that is between my counter tops and bar top. I tried to be meticulous here so that everything was covered and I didn’t paint my sink.
Primer Coat
It looks pretty scary after the primer coat, don’t worry about it. Just keep painting with out trying to go over the primer again and again.
Wednesday morning was the first coat of paint. This coat also took about 3 hours because the paint is pretty thick and doesn’t spread very easily. I found doing smaller sections worked best, using the same method as above. I had also discovered the day before that having a smaller roller would have helped for behind my sink, this is where the 3″ roller comes into play.
First coat of paint
Thursday was my second coat of paint and wow did this coat go on so much quicker…yes, there is a light at the end of this stinky paint tunnel. I had this coat done in about 2 hours. Again, I did grout first on the back splash, then painted and then moved to the counters. This seems confusing, but I did back splash then counter below, back splash and then counter below…so I was moving counter clock-wise in my kitchen to where when I was at the last bit of tile I had done the back splash and counter in the rest of the kitchen. I stuck to this direction so that the tiles had dried evenly through out all the days. I also found myself using my 3″ roller a lot more for the large surfaces. I liked how quickly it rolled and how easily I could maneuver it. This is why I referred to this roller above as magic. I had to do this coat quickly because my son had his jog-a-thon on this day so I only had about 2 hours to get it all done, cleaned up and off to his school. I pulled it off.
Friday….last coat!!! Yippee. I was so tired this day. I ended up using my 3″ magic roller for most of this day because I found that at this point I could use the tip of it to paint my grout so I didn’t have to pick up my paint brush. This to me was gold! So, if you try this, see if you like just using the smaller roller for the grout. This coat I got done in about an hour and a half. It was my 10 year anniversary, yes my husband was still gone on a surf trip, so I had lunch plans with a girlfriend. Bring on the drinks. I was celebrating a pretty white kitchen and 10 years of marriage!
Here is a sneak peak of how it looks. I still need to paint the lower cabinets a pretty gray, change the hardware and have my husband install a new pendant light. I’m already giddy over the change and I can’t wait to share the rest of the transformation with you all.
It looks great Bri! You did A LOT of work and totally worth it! You are inspiring me to touch up my kitchen. I definitely need new hardware for starters! It'll be my summer project 😉