Kitchen Makeover

I am so excited this project. This is by far the biggest one that we have done so far, and most expensive (but not really) It has really changed the whole feel of our home. When we first moved in, the walls were a light yellow up top and a dark red on the bottom with birdhouses everywhere. The kitchen was the first thing that had to go and ended up being the only thing that we re-did, until now. When we decided to change the yellow and red I went with a striped brown/ tan look. And now after seeing how it looks now, I ask myself what was I thinking? At the time I thought it was cute, but apparently it never was. So, a couple of months ago we decided to update our kitchen to 2011 from 1999, when our house was built. Here some before pictures:

Now I took these pictures right as we were starting the makeover. Our cabinets had the cheapo laminate, sticky, glued on stuff when we moved in. All we did to that was just peel it off. It wasn't hard at all! Once you started peeling most of the rest of it would come off too. Then we took off all of our brass (yuck!) door handles. Then we used Sherwin Williams Plum Mahogany stain to stain all of our cabinets. This was not a fast process, but it was worth it. Next, we added beadboard around our backsplash. My husband actually got the beadboard at half off at Lowes because it had a few flaws in it, that we could just cut around. Heres the beadboard backsplash:

We also stained the wood strip that goes around the bottom of our countertops. It really stuck out like a sore thumb before, it was the only thing to do to blend it in. My husband bought some new, silver door handles for $1 each too! Just that makes a big difference. The brass ones screamed late 90's. Then, we painted over the stripes. I was soooo glad to see them go. I decided on grey this time. I just LOVE grey, such a neutral that will make any kind of accessory color pop. The top is Sherwin Williams Repose Grey and the bottom is also Sherwin Williams Black Fox. I really, really love how this turned out. I will show you some more before and afters and soon I will reveal the breakfast room makeover that came along with this project. I am so in love with it! But for now heres the rest of the kitchen: 

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