Charlie's kitchen--open for business!

We finally finished Charlie's kitchen that we made her for Christmas! This was a really great project for us, and we are thrilled with the results! We wanted a high-quality wooden kitchen that will last us through several children (possibly even grandchildren), but all that we could find in our price range were plastic kitchens that didn't really fit our expectations. We even went so far as to interview with a couple local handymen/carpenters to see if we could comission someone to custom make what we had in mind. Then Paul and I just started putting our heads together to see if this was something we could do ourselves, and here is what we were able to make, with a little help from my dad for the "hutch" part of the sink and stove. I'll go ahead and post pics of the complete process, start to finish.

First, we found an old bathroom sink cabinet ($49) from Habitat for Humanity's Restore. We are very happy to have found something that would work perfectly and is also recycled!

Then we attached a piece of plywood ($18) to the top, changed the orientation of the door on the right so that it opens like an oven door, cut out a circle, and inserted a bowl ($3)for the sink.

Here we painted the body with paint that we had on hand ($0), spray-painted ($8) a piece of tubing for the faucet ($2), attached cabinet handles ($8), and some wood discs for burners ($6), and those are actual hot and cold water handles ($17) that we bought at Home Depot! We also found actual oven knobs at the Restore!

Over Christmas vacation while we were in Greenville, my dad and Paul built this hutch out of some bead board and plywood ($0--thanks, Dad!) that my dad had in his garage. It really adds a nice touch, doesn't it? The refrigerator on the right is a kitchen cabinet ($0) that Paul found next to the dumpster when he took the trash out one day! It even has shelves inside!

Just this past weekend, Paul, Charlie and I finished our little kitchen with this window made out of a picture frame and homemade curtains ($4). It has interchangeable scenes cut out of felt ($6) so that Charlie (and others) can look at whatever she wants to see that day--be it the beach (as shown), a winter snow landscape, or rolling hills in the autumn, spring, or summer!
I hope you also noticed that Charlie has been shopping the farmer's markets for her local produce. Above you will see the latest tomato, peaches, and basil just waiting to be thrown into Charlie's latest creations.