Kitchen Cabinets - Done!

We finished painting our kitchen cabinets a couple weeks ago and hung them up last week. They look absolutely amazing! We wanted to brighten up the kitchen, but didn't want the cabinets to be all white since the appliances, counter, floor, and walls are all various shades of white/off-white. A dear friend from Seattle helped me choose the perfect sage green for the bottom cabinets and I couldn't love it more! We opted to spend a little extra on the paint in hopes that it won't chip and will last quite a few years before needing to be touched up. We got Stix primer since the laminate cabinets are super shiny but can't be sanded much because they're cheap particle board underneath. And then for the paint, we used Benjamin Moore Advance, which is designed for cabinets and it looks wonderful! Since we couldn't really do much with the cabinet pulls, we bought new ones (we bought cheap-ish ones, but they were still expensive!). After the expense of the cabinet pulls, we didn't want to spend more to buy new hinges, so my hubby took one of our new cabinet pulls to Home Depot and came home with a can of spray paint that matched the color almost exactly. Just one coat of spray paint and the hinges looked so much better! The project still isn't completely done, we want to paint the pantry doors green also (and we'll put new door knobs on the pantry - the fake gold ones just won't do!) and there is a wall in the kitchen that is still wood paneling, but it looks a million times better already!

And, without further ado, here is the before and after picture!

Little Blessings

Last week was really wonderful, so I wanted to share some of the little blessings God gave to us as He continues reminding us that this is where He wants us. These little blessings have come in many forms, each one putting smiles on our faces - a card in the mail, a box of tea, a visit with family, beautiful flowers, time with new friends, and beautiful weather.

One blessing that particularly stands out is the ladies at our new little church that have been so kind to me since the moment we arrived and I am so thankful for each one of them! A week ago on Friday, a group of about 20 ladies took me to lunch (at an amazing bakery - my new favorite place!), and gave me a "gift-card shower" to help us get things for our new home. I had such a great time and I'm so blown away that God has brought us here, to such a kind and generous group of people!

Beautiful flowers from one of the ladies from church!

Painting...

From my last post, you'll know that we've been painting... Kitchen cabinets take a long time to paint... one coat of primer and 3 coats of paint, plus lots of drying time, plus other life things that mean we don't paint every day makes it take even longer...

In addition to painting the cabinets, we're also painting the built-in hutch that's in the dining room. When we came to visit and saw the house, we initially hoped we could remove this hutch. But then we realized that the carpet didn't go under it, so removing it would have been a big hassle. So I started looking for pictures of similar built-ins for ideas of what to do and I stumbled across someone's blog post about remodeling their kitchen from a 1970s mobile home. And, since our place is a 1970s mobile home, I was inspired! They had almost the exact same hutch, and with some paint (and removing the fake-glass doors), it actually looked really nice (here's that post: http://mobilehomeliving.org/1978-double-wide-kitchen-remodel/). So, I knew that I'd be painting our built-in. I just decided to paint it with the same colors as our cabinets, since we already had the paint. What I didn't realize is that the hutch is big. I mean, it doesn't look big, but there are so many corners and surfaces to paint that it's really big. So... I feel like it's taking forever to paint. I think I started 3 weeks ago and I still have at least one more coat to finish up... We're still trying to decide what to do with the huge mirror, so if you have any ideas let me know!

Okay, here's a picture. Since it's not finished, it can't be a before/after picture, so it's a before/during picture :-)

House Projects

Since we moved into our new house, we've been unpacking and also thinking about which house projects we should tackle first. Before we moved in a lot of people from the church graciously spent hours working on the house for us. They painted most of the rooms and cleaned everything up really nicely - what a HUGE blessing!! The house looks completely different than when we saw it two months ago. But there are still a lot of things to do: painting both bathrooms, painting the kitchen cabinets, installing a blind in the dining room, curtains for all the windows, new doors throughout the house, painting the front door, and planting flowers and vegetables in the garden (there are probably more things, that's just everything I can think of right now).

We've decided that our first two projects will be painting the kitchen cabinets - we already started this - and planting some flowers and veggies in the backyard (mostly because if I don't plant them soon, they won't grow this year...). Just for fun, here are two before pictures:

The Kitchen... Who's jealous of those lovely "wood" cabinets?!? haha...

The Backyard... It needs some flowers!

New Home!

We made it down to Pleasant Hill, Oregon about a week and a half ago, after a day of last-minute packing, loading the truck, and driving (and then unloading the truck...). It was a long day, but with all the help we had on both ends, we felt totally blessed and things got done pretty quickly! We even had some wonderful new friends make our bed while we were unloading the truck so we didn't have to worry about a thing!

So far life in Pleasant Hill has been wonderful! It'll definitely take some adjusting as we have been walking everywhere for the past 3 years and now the closest grocery store is 10 miles away... But we love the green grass and lots of trees around here :-)

Paul didn't start work until yesterday, so we enjoyed some time settling into our new house. Unpacking is still in progress, but we got started on some house projects, so that's exciting (before and after pictures will come later). Our first major project is painting the kitchen cabinets! They're going to look so much better!!

Our new house :-)

Right after we arrived and unpacked the truck

A Bittersweet Goodbye...

Wow! I can't believe it's time for this post... our apartment has been taken over by stacks of moving boxes (thanks Home Depot for having affordable boxes!) and we're getting ready to say goodbye to our first home together. Paul moved into this apartment right before we got married and then I moved in after the big day. We have lots of good memories here, and it's so sad to go... But... We're officially heading down to Oregon tomorrow! We're trying to make the most of our last day in Seattle while still getting all our packing done. It's bittersweet, that's for sure. We have some amazing friends here and it'll be sad to move away, but we're so excited for our new adventure and to see what God has in store for us in this next season :-)

Oatmeal Banana "Cookies"

The other day I was sitting at home trying to think of something healthy-ish to snack on... I had a very ripe banana and oatmeal so I figured maybe I could  make some sort of banana oatmeal something. After some quick googling, I discovered that I could make something with only those two ingredients! So I tried it, and they are yummy! 

Oatmeal Banana "Cookies"

• 1 ripe banana
• 1/2 cup oatmeal
• chocolate chips, optional

Preheat oven to 350 F. Mash banana, then add in oatmeal. Mix well. Stir in chocolate chips if desired (I added chocolate to half of mine). Place spoonfuls of mixture on a lined cookie sheet. I made 6 cookies per batch. Cook for 15-20 minutes, until golden. They're best right out of the oven, but also good cooled down.