Young House Love

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Using Secondhand Cabinets For A Kitchen Renovation

We knew we weren’t likely to find $1 cabinets again (like we did for the office built-ins) but we couldn’t resist checking out the Habitat For Humanity ReStore for the four cabinets that we need to create the peninsula and build in the microwave/fridge (we’re able to reuse the 36″ cabinet that used to live where the stove now sits, so that saved us some major money). The good news is that we found three out of the four we needed! And only spent $90 total.

Restore Cabinets

Yup, we got a corner base cabinet for the peninsula for $50 and two upper cabinets (one for over the fridge and one slightly taller one for over the microwave) for $19 each. And just for reference, to buy those cabinets new from Home Depot or Lowe’s (in the stock, off-the-shelf department) they would have been $219, $96, and $89 respectively (for a grand total of $404). So we saved $314 by going secondhand. Which made complete sense since we’d be scrapping the doors anyway.

The issue with the doors? They don’t match our existing ones (nothing that we hunted down both new or secondhand did since our doors are 30 years old). But to get the solid oak cabinet frames for that price is a steal and once they’re all painted white with new or retrofitted matching doors (from other existing cabinets that we’re not using), no one would ever guess they hailed from the ReStore.

We could only fit two of the three into our trunk. But thankfully they’ll hold items for seven days at our ReStore, so we just came back for the giant corner cabinet with a bigger car borrowed from John’s sister a few days later.

Cabinets Trunk

Now they’re all at home, but not in their places yet (the carport and our sunroom are the holding area for lots of old cabinets and doors that we have removed and new ones that we’ll be switching in).

Cabinet In Carport

Cabinets In Sunroom

And yes, the sunroom looks especially crazy and smells like wood. Could be worse (wood isn’t that bad of a smell, actually). Hopefully in the next few days we’ll be back to share our freshly built-in fridge.

But wait- it’s Halloween. Did you really think we’d let you go without sharing the kiddos in costume? Meet Mrs. Monkey & Mr. Banana:

Costumes Petting Burger

Costumes Sucking Thumb

Costumes Clara Tail

Costumes Running Together

Clara liked doing her best monkey impression (saying “ooh ooh ah ah” and waving her arms) while Burger slinked around looking beyond embarrassed. The second we popped on the “hat” part of his banana, he just slumped down and half-closed his eyes as if to say “this is not ok.” We freed the poor guy from his yellow prison within a few minutes of this photoshoot though. And gave the boy a bone. Actually his monkey friend handed one over. She’s a very generous chimp indeed.

And Clara’s cousin Emanuel (seen here turning two) even got in on the fun. He was a ferocious lion who requested candy corn throughout the photoshoot. Hilarious.

Costumes With Emanuel

Of course the banana + monkey thing might not be as cute as one especially cute combo from last year…

Halloween Costumes

Hope you all have a very happy halloween! Oh and what were you guys up to this weekend? Any cabinet hunting or candy corn binging goin’ on?

Psst- Check out our pumpkin patch adventures (including a family moon bounce and corn bin adventure) here.

Comments

  1. Katie says

    Love the costumes! My two and a half year old, Gunner, is going as the Old Navy Hamburger costume this year!!! I picked it up for $2 after Halloween last year! And our 7 month old, Nash, is going as a hotdog!! I got it at target for 75% off after Halloween! I’m so excited! It’s so cute because his twin cousins are going as McQueen and Mater and he’s perfectly content with going as a hamburger:)

    Reply

  2. Laurie says

    This weekend I got out of the “neutral zone” and bought salsa red suede furniture for my family room. I do love color but I typically like a neutral backdrop and bring in color via accessories since I love to switch up my color palette frequently. But I have adopted the philosophy that all colors go together if you put them together and who says red can’t be neutral, right? I didn’t score the kind of deal you got on your cabinets but I did pretty good! Tonight taking my not so scary witch trick or treating and then indulging in my traditional Halloween dinner of chili and cornbread. Excited about the next phase of your kitchen reno. If I was going to switch lives with anyone it might just be you.

    Reply

  3. Debbie says

    Great finds! Is the hinge broken on the corner unit – causing the door to droop? I had a hinge break on mine and it was an easy fix to get a new hinge thingy! :)

    Clara is soo cute. It didn’t seem right to see her running holding the leash. She is still a little baby in my mind!

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      Yup, but since we’ll be switching out the doors to match the current kitchen ones it doesn’t matter! I think that’s why it was marked down at the ReStore!

      xo,
      s

  4. OMG Ponies! says

    Wow I’m totally appropriating your monkey and banana costume ideas. It’s hilarious. Excited to see how the cabinets work out.

    Reply

  5. Alex says

    i love the picture where burger and clara are both looking. how did you manage thaaat haha! skillz. I also think that clara looks so much like sherry in the picture with her cousin/the lion!

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      Haha- yeah. It was pretty bad in that pic (we had driven down some dusty gravel roads the day before to go to the pumpkin patch). It has since rained! Whew.

      xo,
      s

  7. Meghan says

    Oh my gosh, Clara and Burger have the SAME costumes as my miniture crew, Lillian and Murdock (a scottish terrier)! Too funny. My husband decided to join in on the fun too; he is going as the Man in the Yellow Hat, since monkeys, and Curious George in particular are big in our house.

    Happy Halloween!

    Reply

  9. Lindsey @ arkadian belle woods says

    Ok ok don’t get me wrong. I’m excited to see the peninsula and I know you guys are going to blow it outta the water! But – come on! CLARA & BURGER totally stole the show one this post! SO PRECIOUS! The curly monkey tail! Oh and the monkey walking the banana!

    They melt my heart I seriously don’t know how you guys handle all that cuteness!

    Reply

  10. Cheryl says

    Burger and Clara are too cute! Burger is such a good sport and a great doggie. Clara is not too bad either! Lol!

    Our dog, Ty, is also not a fan of the costumes. My mom made me dress him up as an angel last year and he had the same head-down-I-hate-my-life reaction. He was ok with the hotdog costume this year, but that’s because he was in Petco. He’s always happy in Petco.

    No, I’m not a sponsor for Petco. Ty really loves that store. I should video how excited he gets when we pull into the parking lot. Maybe he should become a sponsor!

    Reply

  15. Erica says

    How fun! I have been loving watching your kitchen transformation! I love those little costumes too! Our dog ( a rottweiler) would kill me if I put him in a costume. He thinks they are feminine ;) HAHA!

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      Thanks for the tip Sue! We actually have a very rare door type that is beleved around the edge (so it half sinks into the cabinet opening and half sits outside of it- like the side of a step). So we haven’t been able to find doors like that anywhere (they were custom made for our kitchen 30 years ago).

      xo,
      s

  18. Kit says

    ZOMG, the costumes are TOTALLY adorable. I think I may have “squee-ed” out loud. (I didn’t even know I could make a sound that high. lol)

    Reply

  19. Rosi says

    My Hubby and I carved pumpkins! We also napped a bunch cause usually on Saturday night we both work 3rd shift (he works 3rd all week long, I only work it one night a week). It’ll be interesting when we start house hunting, I want a small fixer upper that can be tweaked here and there, so hopefully I can DIY during the day while he sleeps. :)

    Clara looks super cute!! :)

    Reply

  20. Lisa says

    Love Old Navy costumes – my son was the cheeseburger last year, too! (He’s 16 1/2 months.) This year we got the blue one-eyed monster. Not sure how he will do with the hood but at least we know he’ll be warm… not that we’re going anywhere other than door-to-door in our apartment building here in Manhattan, but…

    Reply

  22. Emily says

    Oh how sweet!

    Burger looks SO embarrassed – “Just take the PICTURE!!”

    Our pets are so willing to deal with their goofy owners! :)

    Clara is a sweet little monkey – awwww.

    …and great finds with the cabinets – I wish we had a ReStore around here!

    Reply

  25. Carolyn says

    We were cabinet hunting two weekends ago actually! We scored two toy chests at Builder’s Material Outlet (BMO) (http://www.bmomn.com/) to use as part of our banquette! Not sure if they have that store anywhere else, but it’s awesome! Hopefully we’ll finish up this project soon and I can share some pics : )

    Reply

  27. Jen @ The Decor Scene says

    Great finds with the cabinets!!! :) Can’t wait to see it all put together and painted. Your kitchen is going to be amazing when it’s done.

    The kiddos are oh-so-cute….love it!!! :)

    This weekend we painted some dark wood trim around our front door. You know the pain of painting over dark paneling…two coats of primer and two coats of paint and we were done and happy. Check it out here if you would like: http://thedecorscene.blogspot.com/2011/10/out-with-dark-in-with-white.html

    Reply

  31. [email protected] says

    sherry and john,

    do you know anything about cabinet refacing?

    i’m highly considering just replacing the doors, and leaving the existing boxes themselves. they are in perfect condition – there is no need to ditch them, really.

    but…i’ve proven that i’m HORRIBLE at painting cabinetry (as in a recent post, well, rant in my blog).

    i’m not sure what the cost of this would be. but i think i’ll run to home depot shortly and find out.

    if you check out this post http://238windsor.blogspot.com/2011/10/open-shelving.html

    picture with open shelving number one.

    i’m really considering doing something similar with the open shelving above. but…me + paint = bad bad bad.

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      We looked into refacing and it was pretty pricey to get all new doors (I think around 2K from HD?). Definitely worth looking into if it’s the best option for you though! Maybe you won’t have as many doors and irregular shapes (like our tall pantry doors, etc). Good luck with everything!

      xo,
      s

  34. Penny says

    Clara and Burger are the sweetest! This weekend my husband and I went to a grownups-only Halloween party (whoo-hoo!!). He was Steve Jobs and I was an iPhone. Tonight our boys are dressing as a Lego mini-figure and an Angry Bird. Good times all around!

    Reply

  35. becky says

    hello…if you need a cabinet door resource i might have a good one for you. they’re a company out of arizona that has about 30 pages of options (hundred and hundreds of styles) and offer them custom made in any wood – including the cost efficient painters grade doors. we did this for our bathroom because they were weird sizes and these guys will give you cabinets made down to exact measurements. anyhoo, if you need it, i’ll dig it off of my bookmarks file (oh, the days before pinterest, sigh) as soon as my computer comes back from the doctors this week.

    ps – costumes were cute. super cute.

    Reply

  37. Dave says

    Can you not cut the cabinet that had the drawers under the built in wall oven, keeping the bottom half of it for the drawers?

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      Sadly the oven was too low (so if we cut it, it wouldn’t be tall enough unless we built it up and added a drawer or something). But we get to reuse the 36″ base cabinet where the cooktop used to be, so all we needed was a corner cab (check) and now we just need one more thinner cab to complete the peninsula (the 27″ wall oven one is too wide anyway).

      xo,
      s

  40. Mary says

    Have you contacted Cabinet Maid to see if you could order doors? Probably you have and I missed that part…

    Adorable costumes!

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      Yup, we did contact Quaker Maid, which is where we got the lead to the local guy who can make doors that match the 30 year old ones that we already have! His prices aren’t bad either, just gotta see if we can work with extra doors we have ourselves before hiring out the help (we’re happy to do that if we can’t!).

      xo,
      s

  41. Jenn says

    Love the monkey costume! My son was a Monkey for his 1st Halloween and I was the Zookeeper. It was a so much fun and so long ago! This year Spiderman has taken the spotlight! Have a safe and fun Halloween!

    Reply

  45. Katie G says

    Those costumes are so adorable! Our puppy is dressed as a pea today because we always call her “sweet pea”! She’s also not into the head piece, though…

    Reply

  50. Shannon says

    Love the costumes! Clara reminds me so much of my little girl Ivy. She will be 2 in December. We also have 2 chihuahuas, Winnie and Eeyore and Winnie seriously looks like Burger’s cousin!! Winnie and Eeyore are going to be ladybugs this year and Ivy is a candy corn.

    Reply

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