Kitchens Smitchens?

I think smitchens is my new favorite word.  Anyway, the next installment of my home makeover is the kitchen.  While I would have done many many many more elaborate things given the budget-- this is what could be done on a shoestring. 


 The breakfast nook before (peeking into the laundry room... but we'll get to that later)

Again with the flesh tones- the previous owners must have bought this ugly paint in bulk... bleh. 

 


You can barely see it, but above the upper cabinets is another set of cabinets which are impossible to reach and not the most functional.... so I had a PLAN!!



Because these upper weirdo cabinets were just so HIGH up I figured if I did store stuff there it would be stuff I never used and never looked at.  In other words- stuff that should have made its way to Good Will already.  So, I thought, "By George, I will rip the cabinet doors off and make them DISPLAY cabinets!!"  Off came the doors and I painted the inside of the cabinets the same color as the walls, had the hubster install cheap and easy under-cabinet lighting and VOILA!  A place to display stuff worth displaying.... ahh the beauty of it all. 

This DIY kitchen makeover cost me less then $50.  About $30 for the lighting and the rest in paint.  All of the items on display were already mine and just hidden behind ugly cabinet doors.

Have I mentioned my intense burning love for IKEA yet?  Probably.... but let me just tell you that IKEA single-handedly allowed the poor Findley newlyweds the ability to still have a beautiful and functional home.  Fo' real.  We have something from IKEA in every room, and one of my favorite buys (next to our entryway makeover- see here) is the awesome railings and racks we hung in our kitchen.  For another $50, we were able to buy all of the hooks and rails and accessories to optimize the usable space in our kitchen.  With limited drawer space-- and I mean severely limited-- we were able to hang our most-used kitchen utensils and our spice rack and our paper towels and our spoon rest AND our measuring cups AND our wine opener AND our....  you see how the list goes on and on. 

Last but not least on the kitchen tour is the breakfast nook.  Now really, who paints chair-rail molding dusky nude?  These prior inhabitants really made my makeovers more impressive, because ANYTHING is an improvement over what our house looked like before.

We slapped a little white glossy paint on the chair rail and a nice spring green on the walls and it really brightened up the space.

We got the table and chairs from IKEA (of course) for about $70.  Also from IKEA is the artwork and frames and little lampy light on the microwave.  We got the rolling tea cart at a thrift store for about $30.  For a total of about $150.  Not too shabby!

This whole kitchen makeover cost us about $250 including a new kitchen table and chairs-- you can't beat that with a stick!  Have you completed any BIG payoff kitchen makeovers on the cheap? I'd love to hear from you!