What We Were Up To This Weekend...

This weekend I got to spend a whole lot of time with my Mr (read: handsome hubby) working on this:

 

Isn't she a beauty?!

It all started last Christmas when my Mr and I had been shopping for the perfect wooden kitchen for the littles with three things in mind: affordability (read: It's gotta be cheep!), design, and durability. We really liked these (among others)...

Reto Kitchen  (158.00) from KidsKraft

Retro Complete Kitchen ($249) from Company Kids 

...however we weren't too crazy about the price-tags that came with the ready made kitchens that we liked and I was pretty attached to having some counter space (you know for things like mixing, chopping, and preparing food...etc) ...so we decided to make our own! How EXCITING!



We were completely inspired/blown away by some of these homemade kitchens...

Erin over at Ink Tree Press made this beauty. See how she did it here.

This big guy was made by Amy over at Giggleberry Creations from an old entertainment center! See how here.

And I just can't get over this little ditty made by Becca over at Bug Bites Play Food from a little footed nightstand! See how she did it here. I just think this is beyond ADORABLE! (I think I would have done something like this if I wasn't so darned attached to having counter space)

After pouring over hundreds of pictures of play-kitchens we began designing exactly what we wanted. We formatted our dream play kitchen on a program called Google SketchUp which we just plugged our measurements right into. Download it for FREE here.

With our design and measurements in hand we took a trip to home depot to purchase our wood. We spent about $35.00 and got one huge sheet of plywood (4'x8'), two 4''x1'' planks, two 2"x1" planks, and one 2"x2" plank.

We also bought all of the little accessories (knobs, oven handle, and dowel rod) as well as paint, sandpaper, bolts, screws, hinges, nails, etc...

I didn't know I'd be blogging about this later so I didn't take all of the step by step pics : ( Sorry to let you down folks.

This is what the kitchen has looked like since Christmas and we hadn't worked on it since until this weekend (we haven't been busy or anything).

(I promise I'll add these pics tonight soon!)

So this weekend we painted it and made and hung curtains! Now the only thing left to finish are the burners and knobs for the stove! We're almost there!


It was such a gift to create this project with my Mr and I had such a great time putting it all together. It was almost like a date (well...with the littles...so not quite...). I think the reason it was so special and unifying to build this toy together (besides the absolutely exhilarating feeling of using power-tools side-by-side) was because it is the first "handy" project that we have been completely united in and have created/worked on together from thought/design/dream to completion (well almost completion). So...maybe we will be able to build our dream-home together someday...you never know.


....I know you're all dying to know how much this pretty little plaything cost us...so I'll tell you. Our total cost for this project was right around $75.00!!!  That is approximately HALF the cost of anything we found while shopping!

So go grab your hubby and take a trip to Home Depot...where dreams can come true.

Oh! And do you want to see some of the kitchen accessories that we thrifted? Well I can't wait to show you!...But you'll have to wait for another day for all of that.