Cabinets

Our cabinets have gone through quite a journey. When we bought the house they were white and had seen better days. There were drips in the paint and it was super grimy. 

We really wanted dark cabinets so we decided to paint them dark brown.

After a while we decided we hated the brown paint, we badly wanted wood cabinets. So what did I decide to do? O you know strip off the paint and start over. So I borrowed some leftover paint stripper from Geoff's uncle mike. It was a clear gel with strong fumes. Lucky me, guess what I found? another layer of paint under the white layer.... Yes.. 3 total layers of paint and yes that is pink. Pepto-Pink, White and the dark brown we had painted. This first stripper was crappy and I really gave up the idea of wood cabinets.


This first stripper was crappy and I really gave up the idea of wood cabinets. Then a friend of mine, Angela, from Love can make any house a HOME told me about Citristrip. I bought a big bottle for $20 and its amazing stuff. I have been able to strip 8 doors, 7 drawer fronts and 5 cabinets so far and still have a lot left.

After a few things had been stripped I thought I would just strip them down and paint them a better color, but after all of that work to get the paint off I could not just paint them again!  I was able to get all of the paint out of the grain using a wire brush and some paint stripper. After a lot of work I finally had these two cabinets perfect and ready to stain.

I chose to use Minwax stain in Red Mahogany. I really wanted to try to match our dining table because I love the way that wood looks. I applied 3 coats of stain and 2 coats of satin Polyurethane also from Minwax. Over the weekend I started the staining process and today just applied the second coat of poly. I am going to give them a few more days to completely dry and then start hanging them. 

I am so excited! It is always really fantastic to see all your hard work paying off.