Long time ago (almost a year ago), I thought out loud on here that I wanted to do something different with my kitchen and bathroom cabinets, but nothing felt right. Not staining them. Not painting them. I asked your opinion. 11 of you responded with the majority saying to paint them.
Well, I didn’t. In fact, I didn’t do anything. Until last month. I found a tutorial via pinterest and it finally felt right. At least right for my bathroom. I’m still undecided about my kitchen. I still hesitate to put paint on perfectly good cabinets (and I don’t know if I have the skill to do so). And I still hesitate to stain kitchen cabinets in case I accidentally go too dark in a smaller kitchen.
So I just did the bathroom. I figured if I messed it up, it’s a cheaper fix to swap out 1 vanity and 1 cabinet than to mess up a whole kitchen. But I like it! A big difference for a little money!
I used Monica Wants It instructions and it worked great. Some notes:
- I found the stain locally here in Omaha. Was a little bit more expensive than ordering from Amazon, but I didn’t have to pay shipping.
- The gel stain is awesome! I’ve worked with traditional liquid stain before and this was so, so, so nice. The stain goes where you tell it to!
- I didn’t need to use the foam brush like she did. I found that my finger nail was small enough to get into the cracks.
- I didn’t use the painter’s stands just because I didn’t have any. So, it did take me longer since I had to do the fronts, let it dry, flip them over and do the backs.
- I didn’t use gel polyurethane – instead I used normal liquid stuff. Turned out okay, but I went too glossy. That’s my big regret.
I would totally do this again! (In fact, I think my sister has plans to try it out in her kitchen…)
That looks great, Jayme!! What a great update!
What color stain did you use?
General Finishes Java Gel Stain just like Monica Wants It recommended. It was great!