A lighter brighter kitchen

Since early summer I've mentioned the painting of our kitchen cabinets multiple times. We finally finished! Once again I took on the "big idea, no follow through" role in the relationship. I somehow fooled myself that after work and on weekendsI'd go to the garage and paint. It would be complete in 3 weeks at the most. Didn't happen. By mid-October, Chris decided Thanksgiving was the deadline since his family would be visiting. In the end we probably each did half of the kitchen.
So here it is:

Ha ha! Gotcha! No, I can drool over kitches like that all day long, but it could never happen, and really shouldn't happen in a small bungalow.
This kitchen was my inspiration:


I love everything about the kitchen above from the white cabinets to the open storage areas and even the wallpaper on one wall and the funky chandelier. Plus, it looks to be about the size of our kitchen.

So here is where we started. I wish I had taken more before pics. Basic description: Small galley kitchen with very little cabinet space, pass through window to the dining room, and the extra groovy 1970's style dark cabinets complete with the golden harvest Montgomery Ward fridge and matching linoleum. Like the inspiration kitchen, we have an open area to store things. Can't really tell in this picture, but we stored spices, odds and ends cooking necessities and mis-match glass ware. Not pretty at all. So here's the same area after our project. The cabinets got a coat of primer, 3 coats of white paint and polyurethene. Then we organized all of our dishware in the open storage area and hung our matching mugs. I'm trying to decide if I should paint the inside of the storage area. I like the contrast to the white dishes, and that it matches the pass through window, but it may still be too dark.

I've realized my tastes are completly illogical. I love the original 1925 dark wood surrounding the dining room and living room windows, and I love the bright yellow in the dining room, yet I absolutely hated the dark kitchen cabintets and can't wait for that yellow fridge to die and to replace the floor.

Here's the other side. Now all the spices and glassware are nicely concealed in the cabinets.I heard very different advice when I mentioned our painting project. Multiple people told me they had done it and loved the difference. Others said I should just reface or replace the cabinets. A few reasons why I didn't do that:

1. The cabinets were perfectly fine. Seems silly to put them in a landfill when I can just change the look.

2. Updating a kitchen is like "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie." If we put the money into replacing the cabinets, or even refacing them, I'd like to re-design the room. I'd move the sink under the window to allow more counter space, bring down the wall to make the pass through a bar, move cabinets to the other wall...to make all that happen we'd have to open a new doorway to the living room etc. By the time I was done refacing I'd have a 2nd story and have sunk way too much money into the house! (I didn't visualize this in my mind. A house down the street was the same model as ours in the 1920's and they did all that I mentioned above. I saw the open house last year. They must have run out of money because the newly built 2nd story master bedroom did not have an enclosed bathroom. Literally the bed was about 5 feet away from the 4 ft high wall blocking the toilet. Ewwww.)

3. This was an easy quick fix for little money--okay, it should have been quick! Now I'm happy to step into my kitchen as long as I don't look down at the harvest gold linoluem :)

One last picture...I love that we have the exact same style stool as the inspiration kitchen. Galley kitchens and 4'11'' owners require very sturdy, practical stools.