KitchenPics

Looking kitchen from dinning room. The round thing is a Honeywell mercury thermostat from who knows when, probably early 70's. The pendant light is typical Home Depot style with shiny gold finish, agrrrrrh. Left switch is for the main lights, the right one was not in use. Later I found it is for control the wires to each of the four cross sections of the wood beams in ceiling. The kitchen floor is covered with vinyl flooring on particle board under layment.

Typical setup from the 70's but the solid oak cabinets are still considered premium quality to today's standard. The hook is as cheesy as it could be. The cooktop and oven seem to be installed at the same time. They work fine, but just not the style we like. The oven is in good shape and just needs a good clean-up. The range and hook will be gone in the near future.

Any body comes to this house would probably wonder what the hell were they thinking when put that wall paper up in the kitchen. The previous owner did not have a fridge for us which turned out to be a very good. So that we can get one we like instead of getting rid of the old one. The dishwasher is a throw-away even it works. It sounds like a lawnmower.

Unfortunately I did not have the picture of the ceiling they had up there. It was a drop ceiling with gold grids and a plastic ceiling fan/light from early 80's. Throw all that away. Repainted ceiling with off-white rice color. Refinished the walls with light green color and added crown moldings. The outlet with a hook on top is for the clock. Also added little railing on top of the cabinet. The frames around the doors (there are three doors in the kitchen) were all painted white. Stripped all that paint and refinished to natural wood color. Those frames are made from beautiful heart pine with some nice figures.

After kitchen wall and ceiling were finished, I discovered that under the ungly yellow vinyl flooring and particle board under layment, there is solid douglas fur floor. So I removed all the cabinets and counter top. Peel the vinyl floor off, removed some 250 nails in the particle boards. There was another layer dark green floral lenoleum. What a nightmare that was to remove the lenoleum and the glue underneath!! After drum sanding the floor and three coat of polyurethane, it looks very nice now. Since the fridge is wider than the space, I had to move the hanging cabinet out and cut off a strip of counter top. Only a compace (18" wide) dish washer will fit in there now. We like the freezer on the bottom style. Two things: you don't need to bend over most the time you use fridge instead of freezer, there is light in the freezer.

NuTone top of the line hood with powerful blower and micro chip controller. Five speed blower control with timer. Two brightness of lighting. The cook top is Jenn-Air ceramic one piece with surface mounted knobs. When turned on, light shine thru around the knob making a red circle to show the scales. Very easy to keep it clean. Got both from Lowe's for discountinued items. It was a killer deal at $400 for both, otherwise would be close to $800 at regular price. I painted oven cover black to match.

Refinished solid fur floor in kitchen. After removing the vinyl floor, particle board underlayment, lenoleum and glue, drum sanded and sealed with MinWax, then three coats of MinWax pecan polyurethane.

Another view of the refinished kitchen floor. Left side leads to the dinning room and the door to the right leads to downstairs. Before, the base board, molding and door frame were all painted white like the door shown here.