Those Dishes Aren't Going to Wash Themselves

We love our new-to-us, 1920's bungalow. The kitchen? Yeah, not so much. It's small, the stove is old, the sink is scratched-up, and the most important thing of all...

There was no dishwasher.

Okay, let me rephrase that: there was no dishwasher in the kitchen. One did actually come with the house, but it's one of those that wheels around and was hanging out in what we call the "addition" (aka: the all-purpose laundry/office/etc. room). Neither of us were too keen on going into a different room to load and unload dishes, so we knew the first quasi-major renovation we'd have to do to the house before we moved in was to install a dishwasher.

To those inquiring minds, yes, we have thought about gutting the kitchen and completely redoing it before moving in. However, to take a page from Young House Love, we'd like to wait until we've been living there for at least a year or longer to get a good idea of how we use the space and what would work best for us before taking the sledge to it. That, and we'd have to save up quite a bit of moolah before taking on anything too drastic at the moment.

But, for now, a dishwasher and some new cabinetry should do. And a new sink. And a new faucet.

....trust us, it's a LOT cheaper to do it this way. Promise. ;)

Here are a couple of "before" shots, for reference:

The kitchen (not a great shot of the cabinetry, but at least you get an idea of what we were dealing with). One of the next projects on our list will be to add upper cabinets, but the dishwasher is a bit more important at this stage.

And here's the wheel-y dishwasher in the addition (aka: the Rolling Black Cube of Death), which we'll attempt to pawn off on Craigslist:

Since I was battling a wicked bad cold that I caught in tandem with that stomach flu I had last week, Brian did a majority of the work. That, and I'm not nearly as handy as he is, so I trust him a lot more when it comes to stuff like this. I just served as moral support/documenter/small-person-who-could-fit-under-the-cabinets-when-he-needed-something-done-there.

It took a bit more work than anticipated to get the bottom cabinets out since they were glued to the wall. I mean, is this a thing? Who does this? We know it wasn't the people we bought it from since the cabinetry is pretty old... We obviously got them out, but took some doing.

After the old cabinetry was removed, we made a run to Menards to get some more supplies like copper coils and drain piping and whoosies and whatsies and doodads. That took awhile, mostly because Brian was taking full advantage of the fact that Owen was not with us (a couple of good friends of ours graciously watched him so we could get this done). Not having a toddler with us meant we could take our time instead of rushing through the store because he's hungry/tired/cranky/wants to run and scream like a crazy banshee.

Oh, and we also got a replacement cabinet to go next to the dishwasher, in a smaller size. We got an unfinished one because it was about half the price of a finished one, which is just ducky for us because I know how to stain wood correctly (see: West Elm Shelf Hack).

Here's a shot during:

It's not quite there yet, but it will be in the next couple of weeks or so because, um, we need a kitchen. We still need to stain the cabinet, put a board up next to the dishwasher to protect it from the stove, and put the stove back. But yeah, almost there!

A Hunka Hunka Burnin' Love

Let's face it: the appliances in our kitchen were outdated. I'm willing to bet they came with the house, which would make them more than 10 years old. Which really isn't too bad compared to some of the other homes we've seen, but still.

We've learned to live with them, mainly because we've been saving pennies to put toward a new house and because they technically still worked. I mean, it would have been nice to be able to simmer something on the stove instead of only having two choices: boil or lukewarm. It also would have been nice to have a dishwasher that wasn't crazy loud (seriously, when that thing is on, I'm surprised the neighbors don't stop by and ask what all the racket is about).

So when our landlords (aka my parents) asked if they could take our old stove to use in another one of their properties and give us $400 toward a new one, we had a hard time saying no. Brian actually did a lot of the back-end research because I'm lazy I've been busy with other things and he ended up choosing a Kenmore stainless steel beauty. With my stamp of approval, of course.

Here's a before shot of our old stove. Nothing to really write home about.

And here's the new stove. Shiiiinnnnny. Five burners of awesome. (Just ignore that plastic wrap along the bottom handle). ;)

We debated whether or not to get an electric flattop instead, but since both Brian and I are such foodies we ultimately agreed that with gas you have a lot more control over the heat and intensity of flame than with electric. Yes, the handles are in front, which aren't terribly child-friendly, but they do come off with some coaxing (and every time Owen goes near the stove, I shout "DON'T TOUCH!!" and he usually gets the hint). However, the oven does have a locking mechanism that you don't need to activate the oven cleaning feature for, which is reassuring.

Anyone else get a shiny new appliance lately? Any tips on what to use the center burner for (apparently it's for casserole dishes, but any other uses for it?).

More kitchen prettiness.

I couldn't take it anymore. I couldn't stand another minute staring at the sad-looking, stained, and torn blue flowery kitchen curtains that looked like they were salvaged from an old lady's estate sale.

I've been searching for the perfect kitchen curtains for awhile now, and up until very recently it's been a fairly impossible task. This was mainly due to the size we needed, which apparently doesn't exist. Okay, I lied - it does exist, but basically everything we found in stores and online looked like it was cut from the same Old Lady Country Shag collection as our current ones.

One recent Saturday I took one look at them and knew their time was up. I grabbed the fam, hightailed it to Hobby Lobby and bought some cute fabric. Because I'm really not great at sewing, I cheated and got iron-on adhesive and clip-on rings.

I don't have any before shots - just take my word for it that you're not missing much.

Here's the after (you may have seen a sneak-peak of them in last week's post):

Here are the project details at-a-glance:

• Total cost: $30
• Time: 1.5 hours to measure and cut material, as well as iron the hem
• Other deets: I used a 1-inch hem all around, and on the bottom I did a 4-inch hem. The iron-on adhesive worked really well - just make sure you use the "steam" setting with a damp washcloth on top so it gets hot enough to set.

Not too shabby, eh? I still can't stop looking at them - they really brighten up the joint. :)

We have a light!

The light fixtures in our house are so obviously the ones that came with it. You know the ones - brassy, with clear glass and light bulbs that will burn your eye sockets to a pulp if you dare to glance directly at them. Yeah, those lights.

In a desperate attempt to stave off the Seasonal Affective Disorder that I have been afflicted with for what seems like years at this point, I drove my family to a neighboring suburb and somehow blundered into Crate & Barrel Discount Heaven (otherwise known as their outlet store).

I knew I didn't want the typical chandelier for the kitchen/dining room areas, so I was excited to find the following too-cool-for-school option:

I'm sure you noticed the $249 price tag. Although this quirky bunch of teak love was right up my alley, there's no way I would ever spend that much on a hanging lamp.

I checked the price tag, and the total came to...

$30.

No, that is not a typo. It was indeed a cool $30. Granted there was some scuffing on the inside of the lamp, and a couple of minor scratches on the outside, but it was still structurally sound. My reaction can pretty much be summed up as follows:

My handyman hubby installed it later that day. I'm super in love with it, although I'm still debating whether or not to paint/stain the outside once the weather warms up....we'll see how I feel in a month or so.

*Please note that this is not an official endorsement of Crate & Barrel - these are my personal thoughts and opinions.