This will be a long post, but it should have lots of pictures...
It's amazing how much more you can get done over a weekend when you have an extra day. Since it's the end of the year Mike had some extra PTO he needed to use, and I was able to take Friday off of work too. We had the party to get ready for, plus we picked up our dishwasher on Thursday night. We must have been extra motivated because we had all of our house work done by the end of the day on Friday. Yesterday was busy, but just with cleaning and cooking, and then today... nothing. We did nothing house related at all today, and it was fabulous. I miss lazy Sundays.
Besides finishing up some projects in the kitchen, we've also been working on the entry and the downstairs hallway. The walls needed to be patched, primed, and painted. Both ceilings were extra dirty and required 2 coats of ceiling paint. I decided I was sick of the green door and painted it with one of the samples that I had left over from the kitchen. Hopefully we'll be able to put up our new (old) door at some point, but at least it's not green anymore. Oh, the yellow colored accent pieces on the door are actually made of plastic if you are wondering why I didn't paint that part too...
What the entry looked like before, with the previous owners stuff. We took out the carpet and removed the wallpaper awhile ago and then just left it alone.
Door priming in progress. Mike was out at a work function that night so Reese and Cooper were helping me.
We painted the walls the same Antique White that is in the dining room and living room. It looks a little more yellow in person. We also finally hung up our coat hook. Our house has no closets on the first floor so we've just been throwing our coats on the back of chairs downstairs.
What do you think of the light fixture? There was a small brass fixture in the entry, but I wanted something that was a little more dramatic and had some personality. This is the first room people see when they enter our house and I wanted it to reflect who we are a little more. I ended up buying this fixture on ebay (my one and only ebay purchase). It's from the '50s or 60s and made of lucite. I really like it because it is so unique, but I've gotten mixed opinions from other people. Most of the people who came to the party on Saturday liked it... Mike's not a big fan, but I think it's growing on him. I didn't pay very much for it, so if nothing else, we can live with it for awhile before replacing it with something different. Or I might just keep it :-)
Anyway, back to the kitchen... Just to remind you of how it was before, I'm going to include some of the before pictures too. I tried to take the pictures from the same angle. We lived with the kitchen like this for a few months before we cleared everything out to start working on the room:
How it is today: 
We love the new dishwasher, it looks pretty and it cleans the dishes really well. I broiled some chicken yesterday and put the broiling pan (without even pre-rinsing!) directly into the dishwasher... it came out sparkling clean. We also removed the cabinet that was between the door and the window and put up some open shelving that we're going to use for our everyday dishes.
And the other side of the kitchen before (that's a heavy duty tv wall mount thing that the box is sitting on):
I promise that's the same wall. Removing the table and cabinet made a huge difference. That white cabinet is one of that we had in our apartment to keep some food in, we just painted it the color as the other cabinets and spray painted the handles silver to match. The shelf brackets are from Ikea. We bought the wood for the shelves at a local lumber place and just painted them with the same cabinet color. And we kept the wall toaster cause I think it's fun.
Before with the gross trash compactor.
Look how nicely the rolling cart fits in that space with the microwave and the toaster oven! I love it when things like this work out. 
The door on the left is for our 1/2 bath, it's a strange place for the bathroom, esp. since our fridge door opens and hits the bathroom door.
The hooks were an early Christmas present from Mom, we were shopping after Thanksgiving and saw all these great cabinet pulls and we decided I needed some in the kitchen.
I think I'm going hang oven mitts, an apron, stuff like that on it. We have a few little details to finish up in the kitchen, like the baseboards, but it's basically done. I was surprised with some of the things that I picked out for the kitchen (like the cabinet pulls into hooks) because I tend to go with things that are more neutral and modern. But I really like how it all turned out and I love how there are pops of color throughout the room. I like how the red door works now, esp. with the aqua blue. I spent a lot of time in the kitchen yesterday preparing for the party, and I really enjoyed being in the room.
I think we're going to take some time off from working on the house, with the holidays and everything, so you probably won't see many posts over the next couple of weeks. But don't worry, we have more projects planned for next year!
6 Responses to every weekend should be a 3 day weekend
WOW..it looks fabulous! I had to do a double take of the wall with the toaster as it is such a dramitic change. The whole room looks so bright. I like the knobs/hooks,too.
Everything looks really great! Wow! What a difference time, talent, hard work and good taste makes!
I absolutely love the light fixture in the front hall!! Wow! That is the style of stuff I love.
Wow, your kitchen looks amazing!! You've done SUCH a great job.
Happy New Year!
What a beautiful makeover! We love your scrap wood + knob project for hanging aprons and pot holders. Adorable!
xo,
Sherry (& John)
www.thisyounghouse.com
This makeover is fantastic! Love the open shelves. It's amazing what a little paint can do. I love your entryway - your house looks like it has good bones.
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