Kitchen Projects

My husband, Brian and I became homeowners in May of 2012. You could say that 2012 was kind of our year - filled with celebrating our upcoming nuptials, buying the first home we saw and starting our lives together as husband and wife in October. 2013, however, belongs to my longest friend, Meghan. She got engaged, got the internship she's been wanting for 2 years and is house shopping. This is her year already!

Homeownership is the best. Well, most of the time. One of our first memories in this home involves me bugging Brian to put up a canvas piece in our powder room (and quick!) because our families were coming to help move and I so badly wanted one space (even if it was the smallest) to be finished. I'm a little crazy when it comes to projects, but more on that another time. Poor Brian was drilling into the wall until water started seeping out - he had hit a pipe!!!! Thankfully, his dad did some major surgery on the pipe that day and now, it's a heck of a when-we-first-became-homeowners story to tell.

One of our favorite things about homeownership is the ability to make changes - both big and small. Today, I'm going to share one of our newest projects. 

A few months back on a very cold winter Saturday, Brian and I decided to install a backsplash in our kitchen. While we were at it, we changed the hardware on the cabinets - from disgusting brassy handles to sleek black ones. The backsplash project was actually pretty fun. I'm all about projects that can be completed in 1 day. All about it. We got everything from our neighborhood Home Depot and went to town. There are definitely some imperfections, but hey, it's an improvement that is nice on the eyes! 

Then, two weeks ago I started collecting stuff to put on top of the cabinets. I was inspired on Pinterest (typical) and read somewhere how it's a forgotten space in many houses. I don't want to forget spaces in my home so I started looking around at what we had. Bought a few pieces at Marshalls & TJ Maxx and voila! I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. 

Check out the before: 

Please don't judge me for not cropping out the crap on the island. It adds to the ugliness of the Before picture, okay!?

And after:

A little closer up: 

Notice the backsplash? How about the sleek black cabinet hardware? It was quite a game to get the top of the cabinets to look right and get a balance of just enough but not too much stuff. Overall, I'm happy with it. You'll notice I also removed all but one of the magnets and crap we had on our fridge. It was time, folks. I can't even believe I've lived with all that clutter smack in my face for so long - it had to go. I did leave one magnet that speaks volumes to me. This one: 

Isn't that just lovely? I don't mind seeing that every single day - plus it blends in with the fridge which is an added bonus. 

Have you decorated the tops of your cabinets? Are you going to? Do you have this same peace magnet? Leave your thoughts below. 

Thanks for reading!!