Kitchen Makeover Part 4: Add Doors

We left the doors to sit unattached and cure while we were at the beach for the week, and upon returning they definitely were harder, although I was able to pick off a few of the drips (just the top part) from painting the sides.  We got the bottom doors back on on Sunday evening after we got back, then got the top cabinet doors back on on Tuesday evening.  It was definitely a two person job, especially with my bum hand (recovering from the cut and anding sprain still, starting PT soon, should have started sooner).

all done!

with natural light the next day

Before and After

A couple lessons learned:

• Put the screws for each door in one bag per door so they don't get all mixed up and then you use the wrong screws for the wrong door and have to re-do it.
• Before taking the doors off, take pictures of how the hinges go, especially if you have any funky ones like for the lazy-susan cabinet, and check if all the hinges are the same or whether you have one set of cabinets that just happen to have different hinges from the rest.  Note it all or take pics.
• Not sure that the foam roller that we used was the right one as there are still some areas (like the back of the doors - don't look too close if you come over) that are a bit light and could have used another coat, despite being cabinet rollers.  Maybe a different roller or just needed more paint/coats? 

The full story:    Part 1: Prep and Sanding     Part 2: Priming      Part 3: Painting  

And the hand story...

Tiny cut with the blade below trying to get a rubber bumper off the cabinet before painting.

Do not put your stabilizing hand in front of the blade in any way, shape or placement - keep the area in front of the blade clear for multiple feet!  Two feet away was not far enough.

Added a band-aid, continued to sand, then dropped the sander and tried to catch it - possible sprain?

All wrapped up 3 days later to travel to NYC - trying to straighten the thumb

One month later, hand weakness and loss of left thumb extension due to cutting that tendon - the hand doc said surgery is the only option - I'll try PT first thank you, and maybe only ever have 1.65 thumbs up - so much for hitchhiking with the left hand - ha!

Beach Pie 2018 #dairyfree

This pie became called Sand & Surf Pie, not sure why, as the others got called other beachy names for the competition.  You could also call it DF Ice Cream Chocolate Strawberry Pie which would be way more descriptive.


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Dairy-Free Ice Cream Chocolate Strawberry Pie

Crust Ingredients:

5 1/2 ounces (about 3 1/2 cups) pretzels (crush slightly to fit in the measuring cup if measuring instead of weighing)

1/4 cup brown sugar

6 tablespoons vegan butter, melted

Chocolate Drizzle Ingredients:

8 oz. Vegan Chocolate, chopped

½ C. Coconut Milk

1 T. melted vegan butter

1 pint Vegan/Dairy-free Ice Cream – Cookie Dough (but any kind that would work well with chocolate and strawberries would be good)

1 lb Strawberries, cut into coins

Vegan Whipped Cream Ingredients:

1 14-ounce can coconut cream or full fat coconut milk

1/4 - 3/4 cup icing/powdered sugar

STEPS:

• Put one can of coconut milk in the fridge overnight (or in the freezer for 30-ish minutes).

Make the crust:

• Preheat the oven to 350F. Lightly grease a 9-inch pie pan with cooking spray.
• Place the pretzels in a ziploc and crush into very small pieces. (A food processor might be better here, but leave some centimeter-ish pieces for the crunch) Pour into a bowl and add the brown sugar and vegan butter. Stir to combine.
• Pour into the prepared pan and press into an even layer. Bake for 10-12 minutes until toasted. Let cool for 15-20 minutes before filling.

• Chill a large mixing bowl and beaters in the fridge for at least 10 minutes.

Make the Drizzle:

• Place the chocolate, coconut milk, and vegan butter in a glass or metal bowl.
• Fill a small saucepan with 1 inch of water. Bring to a boil.
• Place the bowl of chocolate on top of the saucepan.
• Once the chocolate begins to melt, whisk the ingredients together until all of the chocolate and vegan butter is melted and the mixture is combined and smooth.

Assemble the Pie:

• Take the vegan ice cream out of the freezer so it can warm up a bit
• Drizzle the bottom of the crust with chocolate and let cool (5 mins in the fridge)
• Spoon the vegan ice cream onto the crust and smooth out with a spatula or the back of a spoon
• Drizzle the ice cream with chocolate (if not serving immediately, put it in the freezer now and finish just before serving)
• Layer strawberries on top of the ice cream and then stick in the freezer for a short bit to firm up the ice cream.

Make the Whipped “Cream”:

• Remove the coconut cream or milk from the fridge without tipping or shaking and remove the lid. Scrape out the top, thickened cream and leave the liquid behind
• Place hardened cream in your chilled mixing bowl. Beat for 30 seconds with a mixer until creamy. Then add powdered sugar and mix until creamy and smooth - about 1 minute. Taste and adjust sweetness as needed.

• Remove the pie from the freezer and then add the whipped cream on top.

• Serve immediately (or drizzle some more chocolate on top, because #chocolate) and enjoy!

Competition results?  Second place...not bad!  Beaten out by Grandpa's peach pie for the first time "because it's a classic pie" and I'll add because we were in North Carolina which has fine peaches, and he boiled down the juices to concentrate them.  I see your tricks...

It was delicious, but melted a bit too much before it got to the judges, so maybe for the next competition I should stay away from ice cream.  But I make the pie for myself and I love ice cream, so we'll see.  

Sources:

Crust: https://meaningfuleats.com/gluten-free-vegan-chocolate-pudding-pretzel-pie/

Chocolate Drizzle: https://www.thekitchenmccabe.com/2014/02/12/vegan-chocolate-ganacheglaze/

Vegan Whipped Cream: https://minimalistbaker.com/how-to-make-coconut-whipped-cream/

Kitchen Makeover Part 3: Painting Cabinets

Two coats of paint they said...and after two experiences painting cabinets, I still say LIES.  Maybe it worked for others it was because they did 2 coats of primer and we just did one.  Maybe they did much thicker coats of paint than I did.   It took us 3 coats and there are touch ups that are still needed.

First coat I used the 2 inch angled brush on the corners, then a 4 inch foam roller on the flat parts.  No worries, the first coat always looks a bit thin - see the board above the window.

Same method of paint the backs and drawers, let them dry while painting the cabinets, wait another hour until dry to the touch (who am I kidding, I needed to finish an episode of Home Fires - put that on your watch list), flip the doors, paint the fronts, let dry overnight.

At this point was when I realized how many gaping holes now looked even more obvious, like between two cabinets, or between cabinet and ceiling, so I ended up taking another day to caulk all most of those spots (missed a few I still need to do).

#fixme #needcaulk

I learned that you can lay a layer of caulk in a gaping hole, let it dry then go back and add in some more and then smooth it out, almost building a wall.

I also learned that you really need to smooth it out and take all the excess off as there are some areas where in certain light you can tell that there's some extra caulk around a seem that should have been taken off, either when smoothing it out, or after with sanding.

Finally, I learned that you should caulk before you paint anything.  Whoops!

On to the second coat.  Do a really light sand with at least 120 grit sandpaper if not 220 grit.  Use a tack cloth to get all the dust off (especially if you've also had electricians working in the area who made some dust).  The first corner coat with the brush left streaks so I used the end of the foam roller in the corners to try and get more paint on it and only have to do 2 coats, then roll the flat surfaces.  Still didn't work and in certain lights you could tell it wasn't complete.  So a few days later (delayed by my dance school's feis weekend) I found a 1 inch Purdy brush in my collection and carefully painted the insides of the groves again with a decent amount of paint.  Looks better.  Just be careful around those corners for drips and pools of paint.

A day later we noticed that the sides needed a bit more coverage, and so back I went with that one inch brush.  So now, a week later, I think we can finally put the doors on tomorrow (Monday - three weeks after the start of the project).  Granted, humidity and massive rain storms haven't helped, even with keeping the AC on and aiming fans on the drying paint. #thanksDCsummer But, for about $250 in paint and other needed parts, plus my hours of labor...well worth it.

Here's the current look sans doors.

With family coming in, and to have a bit more functional of a kitchen we put the drawers back in, but didn't fully tighten the handles so the paint could continue drying and curing. (Man that seems to take FOREVER!)

Here's the side by side...see how much lighter it is?

#lightandbright #success

Lastly, last weekend I reattached the light we had under the corner cabinet, and figured out how to hide all the wires in the area we discovered behind the corner cabinet.

Looking up into the hole behind the cabinet

Still needs a bit of work, but better than the wires sitting on the counter

Everything was hung up with command strips behind and under the cabinet as the back panel of the cabinet is too thin to drill into.  From farther away, it doesn't look half bad and will probably stay that way until we re-do the kitchen - maybe in a few years.

Now to just get those doors back up.

Kitchen Makeover Part 2: Priming

After prep, it's Primer step time!

I’ve read different advice about what primer to use and how many coats to do – we ended up using the Benjamin Moore Advanced primer (thanks coupon for making this more affordable!), but I’ve heard that many use Kilz as well.  We did just one coat of primer and then two+ coats of paint, some areas like the cabinet door detailing and the big flat sides needing a third coat than others.  I think next time I would do two coats of primer first, then two coats of paint.  Maybe I’ll try that in the bathroom upstairs…

 Materials:

• Primer paint
• 2.5 in angled brush
• 3 or 4 in foam roller
• 1 in angled brush (best for those grooves, or a 1 in foam roller could work, if they make those)
• paint tray

Steps:

1. Mix up the primer, either with the stick they provide, or by swinging it around so you hear the paint moving in the can like I do, then pour out into your trays
2. Using a brush, cut into the corners of the backs of the doors, then roll the flat surfaces.

1. If you have two people you can have one person doing all the cutting and one person rolling, but if solo, i'm sure there are debates on whether it's better to do all of the corners then all of the rolling, or do corners and then rolling for the first door then move on to repeat on all the other doors.  I like to finish with the brush, then use the roller
2. Paint the back of the doors, then the cabinet bases, and then check the backs to see if they're dry (if not, go have some iced coffee and watch a tv episode), once dry flip so the front is up and paint the front 
   
3. Watch out for drips!  Smooth those suckers out as soon as you see them, and go back around with a brush to catch any you didn't notice.  The fronts of our doors have a deep inset and drips or puddles liked to form on the edges of those.  Also watch out for drips on the sides over onto the front.  All this means: take your time!
4. One coat of primer on everything with just me working took about 5 hours 
   
3. Allow everything to dry overnight.  

Then, like I said I would suggest doing a second coat of primer on everything if I were to do this again.  We, wanting to get this done, went straight to paint time, which I think meant the whole thing took longer (plus the wrist/thumb sprain, plus going out of town for the weekend, etc added time too). 

The worst part is living with a barely functioning kitchen, which is why it's great to do this in the summer when a) I'm off work (teacher bonus), and b) you can grill everything, but remember, that humidity does make paint take longer to dry.

On to Painting...