Kitchen ReFab – Long Overdue

First let me apologize for taking so long to update you all on my Kitchen ReFab project.  As most of you know, sometimes life just takes over and things get put on the back burner, no pun intended!   The cabinets are not completely done.  I cleaned out and organized all the drawers and shelves before putting the doors back on.  This took a while, mostly because I wasn’t interested in doing it but knew it had to be done.  I have some small touch up painting to do, and I still need to decide on knobs.  I had my heart set on some, but then realized they would not look right with our titanium refrigerator (like stainless steel only less fingerprints).

After I primed the cabinets, I decided to add some decorative wood pieces to the drawers under the sink.  These drawers do not open so I will not need knobs.  I purchased 2 at Lowe’s because they had a better selection.

Then I started painting them!  It was the last day of painting and my dad came over to help.  I was getting ready to spray the last of the doors when I passed by a drawer sitting on the floor in the dinning room!  I had put it in there and forgotten about it.  It hadn’t even been primed and I was almost done with the entire kitchen!  I slapped some primer on it and was able to spray it with the last set of doors.  Yikes. Thank goodness I caught it when I did.  I would not have been happy!

After I finished all the painting, and cleaned out the cabinets, I started on the under cabinet lighting.  Believe it or not, this was an easy task.  It just took some planning.  Where to put the lights and how to run all the wires.  Notes to anybody else planning on doing this.  The wires come without the plugs attached.  Once you decide where you are placing the lights, and how long your cords need to be, then you can attach the plugs for each one.  I mistakenly did the plugs first and then had cords that were way too long.  Instead of having to hide them, I took the plugs off, cut the cords down to size and then reattached the plugs.  This sounds scary but this is how they come in the package.

Once you have cut the cord to the length you need, you simply thread the wire into the top of the plug where there are 2 metal hooks that pierce them.  Then you attach a plate cover to secure.

I connected all the wires and decided to run the wires under the cabinets instead of trying to drill holes through all the cabinets and create more of a mess.  The picture on the right shows the dimmer switch.  This is a touch button with 3 settings.  Then the main plug runs behind the refrigerator.  Look how pretty! And you can’t even see the wires, unless you’re my 6 year old.

I LOVE it.  The color and the lighting brightens up the kitchen so much.  I was originally planning on doing an antique faux finish on the cabinets but I’m holding off on that for now.  They look so clean and I’m worried I might mess it up.  I’m sure I’ll get the itch to do it later.  After I complete some touch up painting and get knobs put on, I’ll post the before and after pictures.

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