The Kitchen Project

It was on my list of to-dos for January to clean my kitchen.  I don't remember when I last emptied every cupboard and drawer, sorted and discarded, and scrubbed and cleaned. 

I must tell you up front that scrubbing and cleaning are not my favorite things to do.  

I also wanted to change out the lighting in the kitchen. When we first installed these florescent light fixtures, I really liked them in the store, but I was never happy with the way they fit against the ceiling, and after a while they just seemed too heavy.

I liked the abundance of light from the florescent fixtures that had replaced the standard ceiling lights of the new construction.  The long tubes lighted up the whole space well.  But the lights were ugly and flickering and it was time for something new.

We went shopping and found LED light fixtures that use no bulbs.  In the photo above, the light by the window is already a LED replacement. 

These are the new lights.  But in replacing the old fixtures, we had to paint the ceiling, so we might as well paint the whole kitchen.  

So after days of scrubbing cabinets and drawers, I began scrubbing woodwork and walls.  We moved everything out.

Tom washed the ceiling and the soffits, and he did the taping and painting, while I stayed ahead of him with the scrubbing. 

The first day he got the ceiling and soffits done.

The second day I finished the cleaning and Tom got the walls painted. 

Then we deep cleaned the floors.  I crawled around with a scrubby sponge, a spray bottle of cleaner and a bucket of water to get all of the corners and edges.  Tom used the electric floor scrubber to do the rest.  

We got everything moved back in.  

Because the new lights no longer extended over the peninsula there was a shadow over the stove and counter.  We solved that problem with a different kind of LED lighting, diode strips. 

And now it's all done and all clean and all back in place.

I still have to tackle the pantry, but I need to rest up first.  

And I have a Super Bowl to watch.

GO,  HAWKS!