A Small Project

My kitchen has really been bugging me. I don't have the money to do what I want to, so I'm trying to be creative on a major budget. This is one thing that has bugged me: remember when we took out the overhead cabinets and accidently pulled of the cabinet doors?
This was the temporary solution - a piece of fabric. Yesterday I removed the other door and painted the whole thing white. It will be an open cabinet for now. I'm not a fan of open cabinets, but it's better than the alternative was.

Now, as to my next project - these awful purple laminate countertops. We priced granite. We priced new laminate. New laminate would be affordable, but eventually we want new cabinets and then we'd have to redo the whole thing because the layout will be a little different. While it would look better in the short term, it's a waste of money in the long term.

So, I got to wondering if you could paint laminate so it at least looks decent. What's the worse that could happen? I'll end up with a really ugly countertop that I hate? Well folks, we're already there so it couldn't be worse, right?

I've been doing a lot of research on the internet on this, and some of the faux paint looks surprisingly like granite. At least like the fake granite laminate that you can get now. So I'm going to give it a shot. It might end up looking horrible, but it already does so I don't think it could be worse. I have detailed instructions and it looks like most of it is in the preparation so that the paint adheres to the laminate - then several coats of polyurethane on top so that it has the smooth glossy surface. I figure I can do all this for less than $100 in materials. Worth a try.

In a few years, hopefully the new cabinets and countertops will be a reality, but in the meantime I might as well learn something new and make my house look as good as possible, right?

After I make my attempt at the countertops, I'll finish repairing the sheetrock we ruined getting the overhead cabinets out, and then paint. I'm still really debating on colors for that area - do I go red like the kitchen or green like the family room, or just do a neutral beige as a tie-in with the two rooms? Decisions, decisions. I also need to paint my "new" dining room and bedroom, but I don't know colors for in there either.