Shirt #2 Reveal – oo… and Kitchen REVEAL!!

Ok… SO I was going to wait longer to post these reveals, but I just had to now.

As you can see to the right, this is the AFTER shot of yesterdays BEFORE dress . I wanted to get a “cuter photo” of myself in the after, since my hair looks so rough and I had no make up, but I figured this would work fine.

What I did was gathered the front into a pleat towards the chest.
I also had to take in the skirt part a good bit, it was HUGE.
I then used the top portion of the dress to make straps.
And then added a tie to the sides that allow me to wrap the garment up some. You can actually pull it to the back if you want or front (like I have shown here) – Over all this came out ok. It isnt as comfortable as my last creation... but not to shabby either 🙂

So! Since you all got a glimpse of the kitchen yesterday, I thought you may as well see the ENTIRE PICTURE today.

Im going to be posting a few BEFORE photos of the kitchen as well.

Heres a before of our cabinets in our old kitchen.

The master plan I had when we talked about having the kitchen re-done, was to totally knock those cabinets out. I had this vision in my head that if those were out of here, the room would just open up!!

So heres my before/after sink photo…

As you can see in the before I had VERY little room between the counter/stove area. My before sink also was only 6 inches deep… it was very shallow and made it difficult to wash bigger pots and pans. I actually would have to wash my CROCK POT outside with the water hose before… because it was just to hard to clean inside.

I now have a wonderful composite granite sink!! (Got the inspiration from my friend Kate – who just got a new sink herself)

I also got a TALLER faucet… allowing me a lot more move room when washing dishes. ALTHOUGH with this new kitchen I acquired a dish washer!! I haven’t had a dish washer since our 1st yr of marriage, so almost 8 years now! – A dish washer is incredible to have with so many kids… It will make clean up a breeze when we invite people over as well.

I did however buy a new dish strainer (From the dollar store! woo!), for when I wash bottles and smaller loads of dishes.

My sink is now 9 inches deep!!! Ohhhhhhh how nice it is!
I can fit Owen in it for bath time if I want 🙂

The counter tops I got in a lighter color… I was a lil hesitant about this, I wasnt sure how that look together… but with a combination of the grays in the floor and slight grays in the counter top design, it honestly looks really nice together!

Heres a before/after KITCHEN TABLE view…

We want to eventually get a different table… but for now I dont mind the current one we have. Our current table was my parents. Its very sturdy!!

As you can tell we did end up keeping the paneling on the walls. I could of gotten them to cover it with sheet rock…. but for some reason I like the idea of a textured wall… and I thought the paneled look painted would look awesome with the plainer cabinets.

I …. WAS RIGHT 🙂 and LOVE how the walls turned out.

The color btw is called “OCEAN FOG” – It is by COLORPLACE, aka the walmart brand paint. (semi gloss too)

Heres another before/after picture from a different angle…

We did end up incorporating the coffee rack shelf unit my dad made us.
I loved the design of it & of course it had special meaning since my dad made it himself…

We also kept the POT RACK my dad made me.
I love the easy accessibility of it… and even though we have room now to store pots in a cabinet… to me it looks rustic and unique hanging up on the wall. Its almost like “decor” for the room 🙂 in a usable kinda way.

Heres another before/after pic…
This is of the former pantry wall… and the wall we had in the kitchen that had ZERO cabinets.

It now has a FULL WALL OF CABINETS!

I LOVE all the extra counter space.

Our former pantry (also made by my dad) is being used in our SCHOOL ROOM as storage. Since we have all the extra cabinets, we didn’t need a pantry any more.

I am so thankful to our church family that agreed to renovate this kitchen for us!
I cannot even express the joy I have to now have a nice kitchen…
It has been my dream for years to actually enjoy cooking a meal for my family without the stress of so little space.
& now I can!

I believe the Lord used these past 3 years while in the smaller kitchen, to really humble me… and help me learn to be content with what I have… & has also helped me realize how BLESSED we are…

Also a big thank you to Bobby who did all this hard work!!! He was amazing! – Our boys after Bobby got broken into our family hehe, would wake up and ask “So when does Mr. Bobby get here?” 🙂 I told Bobby last night on facebook that he’d have to drop in every now and then to visit.

He was a joy to work with and we are so thankful for all his hard work.

And for fun, heres one more before/after shot 🙂

You can see these and a few more pictures of the kitchen HERE