Each year, I set myself a winter project or two to do. North East Ohio winters are usually long and I don’t enjoy the cold. But I can only sit and binge watch seasons of television shows for so long. (Last year was Downton Abbey)
Project Number 1 Star Wars puzzle
Not too high to set the mark to be called a project. I beg to differ. I chose a 1,000 piece mosaic puzzle. This is a 1,000 piece puzzle made up of roughly 4,000 photos of various scenes of the Star Wars movies that with shading creates on large puzzle picture. This year – R2D2. Last year’s puzzle project was Yoda and it took 3 months to complete.
Project number 2 Kitchen Cabinet Refinish
Doing any type of home improvement work in the kitchen is difficult. So I knew this was a project I wanted to tackle on a long weekend. So that leaves Martin Luther King Day and President’s Day Weekend. I looked at the weather forecast and noted that we were expecting 12 inches of snow during this (MLK)long weekend and wind chills in the negative numbers and single digits. This weekend it is!!
Our house was built in the 1970s. It was actually built by it’s first owner who lives behind our property now – which is actually pretty cool. The kitchen cabinets are solid and heavy(probably oak), not pressed wood or laminate. The cabinets look like they are the original and the finish has yellowed and cracked over time. They are sturdy and wonderful cabinets. There is no reason to replace them, they just need an update. So begins the project.
Day 1
My daughter and I removed all the cabinet doors – 24. Yikes! I removed the hinges. I went to the store and bought $7 worth of supplies. Mineral Spirits, sanding blocks (150 grit and 220 grit) and a tack cloth. I better mention my daughter works at a hardware store so I did have a discount.
I used some elbow grease to wipe down all the doors, cabinet frames, and drawers with mineral spirits. Then I sanded always going with the wood grain. First, I used the 12o sand block to try to smooth the cracked and splitting finish and 40 years of scratches, nicks and dings. I then went over the doors, cabinets and drawers with a 220 sand block and wiped everything down with a tack cloth. Then I was done working for the day. I went out and bought a pint of bright cherry stain, a pint of a high gloss polyurethane top coat, a brush and a bag of rags – cost around $40.
Day 2
I began staining. I chose a bright cherry stain. Hoping that it would be darker than the current finish that may have began as an amber oak stain 40 years ago. My concern was that the doors all looked so different after they were cleaned and sanded. Some held the original stain and I really did not want to sand down to bare wood while the finish on other cabinet doors were so worn that they were down to bare wood. I was worried that the finish would look very inconsistent.Time will tell.
I enjoy staining. I actually find it relaxing. I use rubber gloves, dip a rag in the stain and rub it on (with the grain). Over my many staining projects of the years, I find this to be the best and easiest way to achieve the results I am looking for. It was true again with this project. This application style allowed me to put the stain on as dark or as light as I wanted. I rubbed the stain in, wiped with a clean cloth following the natural grain of the wood. After staining 4-5 doors, I would go back and apply a 2nd coat of stain the same way as the first. There was limited space in the garage so I was only able to stain a third of the doors at a time. In between dry time, I went to the kitchen and began staining the top cabinets.
Day 3
I woke up this morning and finished the staining the back of the cabinet doors, the lower cabinets and drawers. In the light of the kitchen, the difference in the color is bigger than I thought. The color is so much richer with the new stain. I LOVE it! Now I wait for them to dry so that I can put the high gloss polyurethane coat on. Stay tuned…
Lady Yada Yada 