Over the years I have taken on my fair share of painting projects which have included rooms, cabinets, etc. I have also always been one to want results like yesterday. I will admit that when it comes to transformations this Flip It Chick has very little patience and maybe a tad of project A.D.D. I am also a frugal person so I try to save money where I can. I think we can all agree that with every project completed a new lesson is learned. It took me a long time and several failed attempts before I realized that skimping on supplies is not worth the dollars saved. Below are the two items that I will never go without.
Did You Prime Those Red Cabinets Before Painting Them White?
Funky Cabinets Before
Kinda White After – No Doors Yet
After reading the above title you may already know where this is headed. When my husband and I purchased our fixer upper of a home the first thing that had to be tackled were the red cabinets in the kitchen. We were, and still are, on a very tight decorating budget so paint was the go-to method. To be honest they really needed to be replaced but it was not in the cards at the time. So, I removed all of doors and lathered on the white paint. My grandmother, father, and just about everyone else asked if I had primed the cabinets before painting them to which my answer was NO WAY!! I may have even added an eyeroll as if they were crazy. For some reason I thought I was the exeption to the primer rule. Well, 4 coats of white paint later and my cabinets are still not perfectly white. With that being said I will forever, until the day I die, use a coat of primer on EVERYTHING. I dont care if I am painting white on white, it will get a coat of primer. One coat of primer on my cabinets could have saved me 2 coats of white paint and left my kitchen with a cleaner look.
The primer I use on my walls is Kilz which comes in latex, oil based and odorless for those that are concerned about fumes.
This product can be found at almost all hardware stores but I buy mine at ACE HARDWARE. My local store has stolen my heart with amazing customer service and convenience!
Leaky Tape = Upset Flip It Chick and Marks on the Ceiling for a Lifetime
Frog Tape in Action
I know there are people out there that can paint a perfect edge like nowbody’s business. Well take your perfection elsewhere because that is a skill I dispise and one that I will never possess. For the rest of us that need some tape every now and then there is a great product called FROG TAPE. You can walk into any hardware store and find shelves of blue, brown and green painting tape but the tape that I will ALWAYS have on hand is Frog Tape. I have painted my fair share of walls in order to learn this lesson. Every single time I would try to save a buck and buy random tape I would have bleed trough. This meant that my ceiling would forever have paint on it. WHY?? As previously mentioned the Flip It Chick has project A.D.D. The only cure for that is good tape that works right the first time. After reading reviews on this product I found out there are instructions for use. Don’t you just stick, paint and remove? I guess not. I have never followed the instructions for this tape and it still works great everytime. So ignore all other reviews and take my word for it, Frog Tape is worth the extra money.
**Disclosure: The 2 small photos above are affiliate links. If you click on them and purchase these products you will be helping out Flip It Chick. These products were not reviewed or added for monetary purposes, I REALLY do use and love them both.
If you still need to replace your cabinets you can try looking at Habitat for Humanity Restore, they have a couple of them in Riverside, San Bernardino and Orange County that I know of for sure. My parents got model home grade cabinets for a quarter of the cost. The only cabinets they had to purchase were a few corners.
I forgot a word… lol The only cabinets they had to purchase NEW were a few corner ones.
Thank you Krystal!! We have a Re-store close by and I pop in time to time. It is always a hit and miss. Everyday they have a different item on sale so I go when certain things are marked down =) Thank you again!!