Kitchen Update - The final instalment...

Our kitchen is mainly white and to avoid a clinical look we looked around and the colour red started to creep into the conversation. We have been delighted with our oven and the other day we had it all on to cook dinner, bread rolls etc and it must have been cheaper in the long run as before I would have had to have had the oven on for longer to get it all done. The items such as buns have turned out better and I am convinced the last oven was not right because I could always get good results before we moved to our present house.

So, getting back to the question of a bit of colour in the kitchen. We did not want a steel oven back splash as it looks a little cold and we did see some tiles that we liked but were not sure if it was too much.

After much thought and the knowledge that we could take them back if we changed our minds we decided on these................

As usual the picture maybe does not do them justice, but we found them in B&Q for about £6.99 each. Better value than the alternative in a specialist tile shop and perhaps not as nice. I am not a floral person when it comes to walls but it is a feature and it does seems to work. The other tiles by the sink etc will be plain white, so this is our feature wall.

Our old kitchen had this awful corner carousel thing and it was a pain to keep clean, would not rotate properly and it went so far back that I was convinced that whilst reaching in for a saucepan I would one day find myself in Narnia! So the above IKEA version was a must have and it went together sooooo easily. Light-weight but strong, it pulls out so I can reach everything and the way it is made makes it much easier to keep clean. A winner with us.

We decided to swap cupboards for their extra deep drawers ans it is actually easier to see everything and helps you to keep them tidier. So three of them were fitted in this section of the kitchen. Again, very easy to put together. No messy glue, dowels etc.

The corner area under the sink is always a tricky area so this time we bought some of IKEA's recycling buckets, which are quite tall but slender to pop round to the right but can be easily got to for things that are needed but not used every day. Then directly in the cupboard we decided on their black recycling bucket and two level grey one for every day items and the cat food etc on the second level. So far this has worked very well and stops things increasing and getting out of hand. I had to be quite ruthless when putting the kitchen back together and during the building session it is surprising just how little you do actually need to get by each day. A friend of mine has just bought her own house and we are passing any good unwanted items onto her.

At the moment we have a half size dishwasher (pre-sophie stage) and one day it will need changing. So with this in mind we have planned in for this. So at present that extra space is being filled with these little cubby holes. It has been fitted but can be removed if needed. Once, IKEA used to sell drawers to go into the gaps but sadly they do not do them any more to fit. Luckily these fabric boxes did fit, I could have made some otherwise. So we have one each plus one for bill, scissors, paper etc.

Before - central


Central - after.

Before - left-

After - left.

Before - right

After- right.

Just the white titling and switches to do in the next couple of weeks then it will have taken about 6 months to transform our kitchen

Hubby was the sole builder of this kitchen, what do you think?

xx