My Kitchen Story...

Here is my house and my kitchen story...We decided to build our house from scratch, and live in a RV trailer while doing this.

It all sounded great and adventurous, at first... but this venture took us six months. We lived in this 70's era, flower power, RV from June until December. We live in the north, and it was one of the coldest winters in many years (figures!) and it got a good start in October.

There were four of us, my husband, and 2 grown children, aged 20 and 18, one dog, and one cat. My husband and I took a tent, let the kids sleep in the RV, and my kitchen in this RV was the central office, meeting place, and of course food preparation. Keep in mind that this was a 1976 RV, that we bought for cheap (needed all our money for the house) and it barely drove onto the lot. Here are some pictures to give you an idea of how crazy we were!

Even my cat, thought my kitchen table made a great place to sleep, we were definitly feeling a bit redneck, but we all got along. This RV had a 5 gallon hot water heater, that you had to light from outside (propane operated) and the fridge was propane, this all worked out not too bad until October, when things started to freeze up, and we were not ready to move in yet... We had to have a water tank at the side of the RV that was filled every week, and we had to pump the water from this tank to the RV, then run outside with a coat over your nightie to light this water heater on the outside of the RV, wait 20 minutes then have a 2 minute shower!

We moved onto the lot in June with the intentions of being in a house by October, we had already sold and had to move out of our other house, and we needed all our money to build this one, so there was no renting of apartments for us!

I am not very good with a hammer, therefore I did most of the cooking, but I will admit, the local Pizza place became a second home on those rainy cold nights!.. It was cramped in that RV, and trying to cook good meals in my kitchen, became difficult with a tiny fridge, tiny sink and counter. Further more, if you wanted to use anything electric, you had to go out and pull start the generator!.. Started to feel like Little House on the Prairie!..

I tease my husband, that this was an ultimate plan to knock my expectations of my beautful kitchen down a few notches. In the beginning I was looking through magazines, getting ideas, looking at the latest appliances and gadgets that I would get, and all the great meals I was going to create.. By the time December rolled around, we were into snow, frozen pipes, depending on a tiny RV furnace to keep us alive and warm.. my kitchen expectations were now "just give me a sink and a table and a plug!"... but finally we had to get moved in and in the following pictures you can see the chaos that occured after!

That is my husband and daughter trying to figure out the million pieces we got with my kitchen package!. In the beginning my husband had told me, I would be able to sit back and watch as a team installed my kitchen to perfection!... NOT!.. with most of our money going into a good sound structure of the house, there was not much budget left for the kitchen, so I got to watch my husband and daughter put this package together!..

We were just so glad to move into a warm house by December, it was getting too hard to keep the pipes clear in the RV, and the outhouse we had rented (the town did not want to approve a septic system for the RV so we had to rent a chemical outhouse) was much too cold! The day we had running water for a bathroom and a kitchen was like winning the lottery to me. People looked at me like I had lost my mind, when I got so excited about a bathtub, toilet and sink!

To make a long story short, we persevered, and over the next little while I had to get creative with my kitchen with no money, but also had to keep it legal for the township. The inspector told me, I had to have a working sink, and a wipeable surface.

We had all the basics in, like the kitchen cupboards, wiring, lighting etc, but could not afford the countertop right away, we had some plywood left from the floors, and we cut it to fit the counter, I primed it, put a trim piece around the edge, and then painted a faux finish to look like marble! I varathaned it, and it looked great and lasted a good long time, it also passed the inspectors eye! I also fashioned a blacksplash out of drywall compound. I taped off 3 inch squares with 1/4 inch painters tape, trowelled on compound, peeled off the tape while it was still wet (so as not to crack) and then let it all dry, sponge painted the "faux tiles" then coated it all with varathane, and my friends and family thought I had tiled the wall, so for about 100 bucks, we created a homemade counter and backsplash, and it survived for 2 years, while we finished other things in the house.

Finally this year, I got the granite countertop I had been hoping for, and real tile backsplash, and it looks great!.. but my friends actually miss my homemade kitchen.. then said it had personality, not something out of a store!.. This just proves, that your kitchen is an extension of your personality, and you don't have to spend thousands to give it a warm and inviting feel.

This was my story, and it is actually still continuing, I think it will always be the 'never ending story'.. kitchens are always evolving... but I hope to inspire you with some great ideas, the latest gadgets, and hopefully you will create your pampered kitchen, and hopefully with not so much work as mine was!