Kitchen Update

We've lived in our wonderful home for almost two years and have always talked about re-doing our kitchen. Granite, stainless steel, fabulous lighting...the list was more than a few items long. While our dream kitchen might look something like this:

or this:

...our current kitchen looked like this:

So, how could we update our kitchen without breaking the bank? Well, our first stop was Lowe's, where we walked up and down the aisles, notebook in hand, and listed out pricing for appliances, countertops, etc. With only a few items on our list, we were already over $6,000—not quite in our current budget. Armed with inspiration from HGTV, we set on our quest to update our kitchen on a budget. Here's the steps we took:

Remove cabinet doors.

Measure doors to drill holes for new hardware.

Prime all wood cabinets and doors with an oil-based primer.

Attach base molding for a decorative element (nails were not cooperating, so we used Apoxi).

Paint cabinet doors with secondary color. We were attempting an antiqued, textured look and were planning on wiping away some of the primary color to reveal the antique white.

Paint black onto decorative elements. Use putty knife to gently scrape away wet paint and reveal antique white below.

Paint remaining cabinets black. Allow to dry overnight before putting doors back up.

Attach doors to cabinets. The night before, we painted the edge of the doors that were on the hinge side. This way we could paint the remaining doors' fronts and backs and leave them open to dry. It saved time and cleanup!

The final product (we're still working on the accessories above the cabinets):

Our kitchen update included:
• Brushed nickel hardware for drawers and cabinet doors
• Lighting for underneath cabinets
• Crown molding above cabinets (we bought extra for potential cutting mistakes–and we used them!)
• Base molding below cabinets
• Paint, primer, supplies

Our total project from start to finish was June 13th-21st. All this for under $250! Not bad, considering a brand new kitchen re-do can cost $10,000+.  What do you think? Did we pull off a modernized kitchen?