A Beadboard Backsplash

Hello friends and welcome back! Again, we're sorry for our little hiatus. I'd like to come back from it with a little bit of a bang, and I thought showing you my new beadboard backsplash might be just the way to do that. First, a reminder of the old backsplash. Warning: the following pictures are not for those with weak stomachs.

Blech!

Blech blech!

I HATED that backsplash. It's not real tile, it's just a board that looks like tiles. And it's this weird blue/silver/whatever color that I think was chosen by the previous homeowner to match the appliances but it does NOT. I also hated how it didn't go with anything else in the kitchen. The counters and cabinets are both very warm colors and the backsplash is all cold and yucky.

Ok, so now that we've established that I was not a fan of the silver tile backsplash, we can move on.

The first thing we did, one of the most fun parts, was tear down the old (ugly) backsplash. We

lived with this for a couple days before Carrie and Stan came down to help put the beadboard up.

First we measured and cut on Stan's kick-A saw. Stan gave me a lesson in how to use it so I even did a little cutting myself. Maybe some day I'll own one of those babies and I'll be a sawing fool :)

Check out those glasses.

What a good sport :)

Next we measured where the outlets were and cut holes out of the beadboard using a jig saw.

I'm sure that there's some rule against using a jig saw in your sink, but what can I say, I'm a rebel.

And in case you were beginning to wonder if I did any of the work myself, I promise, I did.

After that we used liquid nails on the back of the beadboard and pressed it up there. We also nailed it in a few places along the top and bottom that we hoped would be covered by the trim (which was only the case in some places, of course).

For the places where the nail holes showed, a little caulk did the job.

After that, we painted the trim and put it up. The mitered cuts make it look stellar.

And finally, I painted it all with two coats of white paint.

Once the backsplash was up, all that was left was to paint the walls. I really wanted yellow but I was very nervous about it. Once, back when Justin and I were still dating and he was living in his bachelor apartment, I attempted to Martha Stewart it for him (what are girlfriends for, right?) by painting the kitchen yellow. To say it looked like a circus would be putting it nicely. So I was trying avoid that and instead went with a much more subtle creamy yellow, and I have to say, I love how it turned out.

Thanks Beeb :) 


 So here it is friends. The final(ish) product, with new backsplash and freshly painted walls.

I know the yellow doesn't show up very strong in the pictures, and it's really not overwhelming even in person, but it is at least a bit more visible in person. The name of the color is Homestead Resort Tea Room Cream.

I had originally planned to paint my cabinets white as well because I was really hating the color. However, after I saw them against the white of the beadboard instead of that gross silver whatever color, I really started to appreciate them much more. I've decided to leave them as they are. Whew, that saves me TON of work in painting them. Now all that I have left in my kitchen re-do is to add hardware to the cabinets, maybe someday get my butcher block counter top for the island, and of course, the never ending quest for interesting stuff to put above the cabinets. I've found even more stuff since these pics were taken, and I'll show you some day when I feel like it's done. Or at least done enough.

I got the flower pictures in the above pic from the NYPL Digital Gallery (totally awesome place to find tons of interesting and unique prints, which you can download to your computer and print for FREE!) and put them in dollar store frames that I spray painted white and used some black poster board as a matte. I made the chalkboard myself because I could find a round or oval chalkboard ANYWHERE that didn't cost an arm and a leg. I'll show you how I did that in another post, promise.

That concludes the beadboard backsplash. It's been done for several months now and I am still loving every bit of it. It's simple and classic and it's the perfect touch to this kitchen. I have not missed that old tile once. And finally, a huge thanks to my bro-in-law Stan for helping me with this project. I couldn't have done it without his help!