Modern Country Style kitchen part 1

Hi there.. So glad to see you back here again! Come right in and make your self at home.

If you're new here and liking what you're seeing, please would you make my day and follow Modern Country Style by clicking the Follow button just to your right? That button is so lonely and just waiting for your lovely little mouse to click on it! ;-)

So......the painting is done. Hooooooooray! No more paint in my hair, and under my nails and on my face. No more going out and friends saying, "Working on the kitchen still?" Yeeeehah! AND Mr Carpenter has been and gone and woven his wooden magic. The man done good and, let me tell you, it makes SUCH a difference. So different. So, sooooo different!


I took a gazillion photos because I was just so pleased! Are you feeling my carpentry love, people? But look? Don't you agree?


Yes, it's this old photo again. I include it every time at the moment, I know, I know. I only wish I'd taken more before shots. But I have to include it so you can see each time how grim it was before.


We had both the shelves and the wooden upstands (this is Mr Carpenter's word. Is it the right one? Do they have another special name? Please let me know....) made from beech to match the beech worktops. They're not a perfect match yet colour-wise (although I'm not sure anyone else using the kitchen would have noticed the difference. It's pretty small. But I do!!) but Mr Carpenter assures me that, once they're in use and in the sun, they'll mellow down.


I had a picture in my mind of how I wanted the finished shelves to look and what I wanted on them. With these things in mind, I measured out how far apart the shelves needed to be and made corresponding pencil marks on the wall (much to the children's horror: "But, Mummy, you're drawing on the wall...."). The shelves needed lots of coats of Danish oil on them, and are just resting on their supports so we can take them down for future oiling. Is it just me or is Danish oiling one of life's loveliest jobs? I love the smell and the rubbing.....Okay.....it's just me....




I noticed in pictures of kitchen in magazines that I like, they either had tongue and groove splashbacks or they had short upstands (any ideas? They must have a proper name...) at the back of the worktop in a material that matched (e.g. wood or granite). The more I thought about the two different looks, the more I liked the upstand version. I think it's one of the elements in our new look kitchen which now marks it out as country with a modern twist, rather than just traditional country, as tongue and groove might have done. A Modern Country Style kitchen, you might say!


Next stop is filling my glorious new shelves with all the lovely goodies I've been holding back until this moment. I can't wait to show you.