When I say "we" I mean "he".

Remember this picture from my Christmas summary post?

You know, the one where mini was less than enthused about the gift I bled, sweated and cried over for about a month before it was finished?  Yeah, that.

In her defense, she had the flu.  Now that she's better, she loves it.  (I swear.)

So this is the post where I show you what it looked like before I took a saw/hammer/drill/electric screwdriver/paint to it.  The post where I tell you how I took it from the $10 I spent at a garage sale:

To the beautiful, modern kitchen it is today:

Yes, that's right.  I'm doing it.  I'm showing you way too many pictures.  I'm giving you the whole before and after.  Why?  Because, doggone, I'm proud of this baby.  I don't work with power tools a ton.  And this required the whole shebang.  This is something I've been wanting to do since I pinned this bad boy:

                                                                            Source: martawrites.com via Kimberly on Pinterest

And I finally did it!  With COPIOUS amounts of help from my daddio.  Just throwing that in there.  So I think I'm entitled.  The good news is you won't have to scroll through a ton of "during" pics, because I was in a mad scramble to finish this for Christmas and didn't take any "during" pictures.  Just,

And  I also think it's unlikely you'll find a little cupboard EXACTLY like this one (definitely made in the 60's by the way) so why do a whole tutorial, right?

Instead, I figured I'd show you a bunch of "after" photos and explain how things came together, in case you're making a kitchen and need ideas/tricks.  Ready?

Phew!  Tiring just looking at it.  So let's take a little cake break, ok?

Much better.  Especially since I didn't make those, just bought them at the target dollar section.  Now, on with the show.

Let it be said, I am no power tool expert here.  And I had a lot of help.  Did I mention that?  Moving right along... The first thing we did was focus on the front of the kitchen.  I wanted the oven door to open like an oven door - makes sense, right?  So I removed the doors.  I would have reused them, but they weren't the right size for the opening when turned on their sides.  So we measured the space around the top shelf and cut a wood plank (I think it was a 4x4?) I had laying around in my garage.  We used very small flat hinges and attached three along the bottom (could have gotten away with two, but we played it safe).  We then used a screwdriver to reattach all the magnets/metal plates that were used in the original kitchen to keep the doors closed.  There is one on each side along the top edge.  We screwed in 4 small eyes and used a pliers to open them and attach the two chains.  Then we just cut a scrap piece of wood into a little strip and screwed it to the front for a handle.

I should note that when placing the eyes for the chain, you will need to indent them from the edges on the door piece - NOT line them up perfectly level with the eyes above.  This way, when you close the door, the chain will not get all bunched up and in the way - very frustrating for little hands. 

We left the bottom shelf as it was for open shelving.  The inside of the oven is currently storing food.  Maybe someday we'll build her a fridge, huh Dad?

At this point, I informed my dad that the kitchen absolutely MUST, and I mean MUST, have a window with a curtain.  I already knew what fabric from my stash to use.  I just had to figure out how to get a window in there.  Turned out, my suggestion of nailing on some boards and drilling some holes, then inserting a dowel was, actually, the right one.  Who would have thought?  So that's pretty much exactly what we did.  

Just make sure you remember to sand the whole kitchen first, then paint the whole kitchen before you put up the dowel with the curtain.  We actually measured and drilled the large holes, then screwed in the two side pieces and left it like that until we were ready to paint.  Then we painted and placed the curtain.  Luckily, we drilled our holes to the perfect size and didn't need to use screws OR wood glue.

Next, we focused on the top.  I sanded it and painted, the "backsplash" area too.  I used epoxy putty (specifically, this stuff:

) to glue down the paint can lids for the burners.  I probably could have fit four down, but #1, I kind of wanted some "counter space" and #2, two was all we could get for free.  So it's a European style stovetop.  Then we (and by we I definitely mean my dad at this point, since I'm still scared of saws.  Have to get over that sometime...) sawed the circle for the sink.  You should have seen us with the string and the pencil trying to draw a perfect circle with just the right diameter so the lip on the metal bowl I used would hit perfectly in place... we had to get mr out in the garage to help us with some math and in the end I just eyeballed it and hit it dead on.  Booyah!  Anyway, we used a jig saw for that.  We drilled the holes for the faucet while we were at it.  Then we inserted the faucet (which I got at the restore for three dollars and it might be my favorite part aside from the curtain).  Then we used the same epoxy putty as before around the lip of the metal bowl and pushed the sink in.

You can see in the 4th picture there, how the sink sits down into the oven, but not too far.  I bought no less than THREE metal bowls before I finally "gave up", then went to the thrift store and low and behold found the perfect size.  Sigh.

So now is when I did paint touch-ups, taped some things off and added a few paint details. I wish I'd thought to paint the dowel before inserting it, but at least it's generally covered.

I spray painted two of the four existing knobs silver and screwed them back in.  Then I screwed in a little silver handle where the other two knobs were below the sink for a hand towel to hang.  The last thing was to add a few hooks to the side for potholders and such.

Mini got a pots and pans set from Oma and Opa for Christmas and a little "kitchenaid" mixer from the mr and I - since the kitchenaid is my very favorite kitchen appliance.  Better than the fridge, I tell ya!  The potholders came with the sets, so I didn't make any of those.  BUT, when I am not frantically setting up space heaters so the paint will dry in time for me to throw a blanket over it so it can be "unwrapped" in an hour, I have plans to make some accessories.  You know, apron, oven mitt, dishtowel, etc.

I did whip these up quick with some crystal light containers and duct tape:

Easy shmeezy utensil holders!  I happen to think they're pretty great, which is cool since they took about 2 minutes to make, cost me ZERO dollars and have lids to keep everything tidy.

I also managed to whip up this little cookie kit for mini, which was another christmas present:

Tutorial to come!

So far she has some pizza from Aunt Al, some cupcakes and cake from tarjay, some felt cookies and some wooden cookies and wooden donuts from Aunt Al as well.  I think she has the main food groups covered, but I'll try to work on adding to the menu just for fun.

Also to come, hopefully shortly, a tutorial for this guy:

Don't know why it's a "guy" when it's pink and has a bow, but whatev.

Aren't you glad I'm done subjecting you to photos of this kitchen?

For now.

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