Hello, dirty, old, worn out cupboard! I love you - even if you do look terrible these days.
This old cabinet and I go way back. When Pete and I got married we put every penny of our wedding gift money (around $1000) toward the down payment on our first house. (The house that was a few blocks from the circus.)
We lived there for only three years, but those three years were huge.
We had just gotten married, we had moved away from the only community we had really ever known, and a couple of years later Sage was born within those walls.
This house was where we spent that first hard year of parenting as we struggled to find our groove as a family of three.
Just after closing on the house in 2000, we found the original kitchen cabinets in our garage.
I fell hopelessly in love with them, so Pete converted one larger base cabinet in to an island, adding a salvaged butcher block top. We hauled that heavy cupboard back into the kitchen where it was built, and I painted it my then favorite green - a perfect fit for our cheerful yellow kitchen.
When we moved I couldn't bear to part with it, so we've hauled this cupboard from home to home for the past ten years, parking it in back corners of various garages as it awaited a reason to be once more. (I can't think of anything else we've done that with. I'm pretty quick to let things go that seem to have no purpose.)
But when we moved to the farm this fall it was time to put it back into action as the centerpiece of our kitchen - worn out paint and all. (Or as we call our tattered belongings, "more shabby than chic".)
Yesterday while the kids were playing with friends I set to work to wake up that sleepy cabinet. An hour (and a half-quart of paint) later, it was a whole new piece of furniture. I kept squealing every time I saw it for the rest of the day. Hello aqua cabinet!
Interestingly, as I cleaned up the cabinet for painting I noticed that several layers of pant were chipped in a few places. And the base coat from 100 years ago - hidden beneath my Martha Stewart green and lots and lots of white - is nearly identical to the color I chose.
I love that.
The hardware was already painted, so for now I've just repainted it. My intention is to pull off and strip all of the hardware some soon day.
And now this kitchen is starting to feel just right. Oh yes. Home.
My color palette for this tiny kitchen is above. Light gray walls, dark gray cabinets, light aqua ceiling, and yellow accents.
Oh what a difference a little paint can make.
And now, what to do with that other 1/2 quart of paint...