What I Learned from My Kitchen Renovation
Are you thinking about a kitchen renovation? Then let me share what I learned from my kitchen project that I recently finished - the good, the bad and the ugly.
At the beginning of the year, I shared this blog post with a quick video tour of my finished kitchen as well as the final costs of my renovation. In today’s post, I want to give you some specific feedback since it’s been about four months.
One of the best things I did was add great accessories inside my cabinets. In the corner cabinet, I added pull-out shelves. This was a great solution for the blind corner and gives me great storage for my oversized pots and pans. I also added two roll-out shelves in the small cabinet next to my range for every day pots and skillets. Doing this really keeps me from banging the side of the cabinet when pulling them in and out. I also LOVE the self-closing doors and drawers on all the cabinets. No more slamming!
Another upgrade I’m glad I did was my pantry shelving. The pantry closet is pretty large, but the wire shelving I had wasn’t using the space to its fullest potential. So, I designed an L-shaped arrangement with narrower shelves on the side. I used this Lazy Susan and this Expand-A-Shelf for my canned goods. To save money, I did the painting myself and let me just say - I couldn’t move my right arm the next day. Shallow basket trays are a great way to keep food categories together. I use one for chips, bread and sweet treats.
My biggest aggravation, so far, is my kitchen faucet. My original faucet had continued delays, so I had to make a quick change. My salesperson only sent me images and I didn’t realize the new selection was a touch-less faucet until it was installed. It’s very sensitive and I’m constantly turning it off. I’m going to look into possible disabling this feature to see if will work better for me. I do love the black and have had no issues keeping it clean.
Let’s talk appliances. I’ll admit that I didn’t do a lot of homework before decided on the Cafe Appliances by GE and this also was my first experience with purchasing new appliances. I did see them in person, but I’ll admit that I strictly purchased on looks. I wanted white appliances and these had the style that other brands were lacking. The dishwasher cycle takes 3 hours from start to finish, which seems extremely long to me. I’ve tried the shorter ones, but my dishes don't get dry. The electric range is very inconsistent in how it heats. The eye is either bright red (really hot) or cycles off to keep the temperature. And so far, the refrigerator has been the biggest disappointment. After taking SIX MONTHS to arrive, I noticed that the motor is loud. At first I thought I just wasn’t used to having a refrigerator in my kitchen, but after doing some online research - this seems to be a common complaint. For what I paid ($8,000) I was hoping for more than just “pretty appliances”.
Now, let’s end this post on a high note. I absolutely love my backsplash tile! I have not had any regrets using the blue and everyone who sees it comments how pretty it is. I know most of what you’re seeing out there are white kitchens, but let me recommend taking a chance with your backsplash. It’s not a huge investment and is easy to change if you ever want to. I also like I laid it on a 1/3 pattern instead of a traditional brick lay.
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Thanks for Reading!
Jennifer