This past weekend, we tackled putting together all the drawers, attaching the 32 drawers and 8 doors to the cabinet boxes followed up by adding shiny new hardware.

The drawers weren’t hard to put together, but there were so many, both of our hands had blisters on them before we were finished Saturday night–which is when most of these photos were taken so I apologize about the lighting. But the blisters (and back aches) were the only downside to the project. Truly, it was such a rewarding turning point in the kitchen; We have real usable cabinets!

Like most projects, Chris and I come up with a system that works well for us. In this case, I put together the drawers and he attached all the doors and drawer rails to the cabinet boxes. Over and over and over again. When it came time for hardware, he marked and drilled little pilot holes (this tool is a must have for attaching hardware!) and then we both screwed in the hardware by hand.

Just like in the laundry room, we used these 4″ mission bin pulls from Rejuvenation in unlacquered brass on all the doors and drawers alike. On the doors, we mounted them in the same place we would the drawers and I love how everything looks uniform. One particularly wide set of 36″ drawers, we added two pulls to each drawer and it completely transformed the budget Ikea cabinets into something much more high end.

Spending a few hundred dollars on hardware will really make even Ikea cabinets shine. Hardware is a great thing to splurge on, in my opinion.

We didn’t get to the cover panels or toe kicks this weekend, so all of the brown cabinet boxes and legs you’re seeing will be covered eventually–hopefully before the week’s up! One change to the kitchen’s layout we haven’t talked about much, but is finally becoming apparent in photos is the island and island seating specifically. We still wanted a place to casually sit in the kitchen and island stools are so great for that, but in the former kitchen, the seating was on the right side of the counter making that portion an unusable work space. Since we moved our fridge (and microwave) to that side of the room, we really wanted to keep the adjacent countertop accessible and functional for prep. So, the walnut countertop will extend out toward the dining room leaving an overhang in that direction for tucked in stools. The solution not only makes the kitchen feel larger, the workspace is more functional and we gained extra cabinetry on the right side.

With all of this, a few of you have expressed that it seems like we’re about done. Yes and no. We have come so far and most of the dirty work is done, so I can see how it must feel like there should be a reveal, like, tomorrow!–especially now that all the cabinets are in and usable. But, there’s still quite a bit to do and we don’t want to lose momentum in the final stretch. This weekend, we even thought about loading up the cabinets, but we fear that if we don’t finish 100% before “moving in”, we might never finish lots of little things.

We still need to:

-Finish dyeing the tile grout (you can see it started on the left side but not on the right)
-Sand, seal and install the walnut countertop on island
-Build island support legs
-Install toe kicks, cover panels and trim (including window, crown and baseboards)
-Tile and grout the backsplash (we’ve been working on this the past two nights!)
-Seal the countertops
-Stain/Install the pocket door
-Install accent lights including island lighting and sconces
-Order stools for the island
-Order runner(s)
-Install all appliances (next week!)
-Hang open shelves on either side of the window
-Design and build the range hood cover
-Design the pantry shelves

We’d still, ideally, like to be done by the end of next week but we’re taking it a day at a time and still crossing our fingers everything continues to go smoothly.