We did it. Holy cats, we did it.
Just a few days before Christmas we started Clara’s homemade play-kitchen (in secret of course, since she thinks Santa brought it)… and we actually finished it on Christmas Eve! Yes folks, it was a Christmas miracle. We went into it with a goal of spending under $99 since this basic play-kitchen from Ikea is that price – but we wanted to add a bit more detail like oven knobs that actually turn, an oven light that goes on and off, a wire baking rack inside the oven instead of a shelf, and a real faucet (not plumbed of course, but movable!). So here’s how we made our own little Clara version in the last 72 hours before Christmas, for what ended up being $74.
More pics in a moment (lots more!), but first the dirty details. The core of our homemade kitchen was initially going to be a real kitchen cabinet, so we had it around already (yessss!). It was actually the one we bought for $14 from the Habitat For Humanity ReStore when we intended to hang a big microwave next to our pantry. Heck, we even hung it temporarily when determining where we wanted the electrician to add our microwave plug a while back.
But in the end it never got used (since we opted for a smaller microwave – more on that here) so we hung onto it in preparation for its eventual rebirth as a play kitchen.
It was a little low (only 15″) so we began by building it up on the bottom with a quick box made out of a 1 x 4″ remnant that we had in the basement. We offset it from the front a bit so it would even look like a real base cabinet in a kitchen (toekick and all).
John also had a spare 1 x 12″ board in his scrap wood pile that, when paired with a leftover plank from our desk-building project, fit perfectly as a counter and low backsplash. Well, perfectly once they were cut down a bit.
Picture me rubbing my hands together maniacally and saying things like “it’s all going according to plan!”
But before attaching all that, we had to build our sink area. We hit up the ReStore again and snagged a real faucet and handle for $10 (and inadvertently crashed their company Christmas party in the process – sorry ReStorians, thanks for letting us quickly grab that faucet!). We thought those two real kitchen features paired with a metal bowl (found at Target for $7) would make for a purty chrome and stainless steel kitchen sink area. Only the best for our girl. Haha.
After tracing around the lip of the bowl, John jigsawed a hole just inside the line (so the edge of the bowl had something to rest on). It didn’t have to be perfect since the bowl would be covering it.
After cutting matching holes in both the counter and the cabinet top (and sanding them both smooth), the bowl was officially transformed into a sink – just by dropping it in.
I wish I had peeled that sticker off for this pic, but you get the idea.
Adapting the sink hardware was also pretty straightforward. The faucet was pretty much ready to go, but the handle had lots of tubing that was just going to be in the way under the counter.
Luckily, with a wrench and a copper pipe cutter we removed the excess mumbo jumbo. Oh, and since the bottom of the fixture will be concealed between the top of the cabinet and the counter we don’t have to worry about Clara messing with it.
Then it just took drilling some holes…
…and securing both fixtures to the underside of the counter (though the handle was so thick it required an extra block of wood to keep it secured).
Now that we could finally secure the counter to the cabinet, it was starting to look like a play kitchen! So yes, this is where we got all weird / annoying / giddy / hyper.
But just wait, there’s more excitement in store. Check this out…
Every play kitchen needs an oven right? So we bought some $3 fence hinges to convert one door to open downwards.
And we also snagged a piece of pre-cut plexi from Home Depot (for just $3!) so that we could give Clara’s oven a proper window (the girl’s gotta check on her souffles). We completely lucked out that this pre-cut pane was the perfect size.
We weren’t so lucky when cutting the hole for the plexi though. John can’t figure out if it’s him or his Dremel Trio, but he has trouble getting straight cuts sometimes (his words, not mine). It looked okay from a distance…
…but up close he was less than happy with it. Yes, there may have even been some hushed cursing.
So after a dash to the craft store (we had to buy materials for some oven knobs anyway) we grabbed some thin pieces of craft wood and cut a miniature frame to trim out the imperfect opening. Huzzah for Plan B!
We didn’t want to actually attach the plexi until we were done priming and painting, so it was onto making some knobs for the oven. I guess knobs are usually for a stove, but we figured it wouldn’t hurt to have something for Clara to spin and interact with. So we took some small wood discs from Ben Franklin (for $2) and drilled a hole in the center for a washer and bolt.
Luck was back in our favor when it came to drilling holes for the nut on the back of the oven door. The Kreg Jig drillbit (which has a small pilot drill on the tip before becoming larger) made the perfect sized holes for not only sinking the nut into the door (since our oven wouldn’t close if they weren’t flush) but also kept the nuts from spinning too, which made attaching everything really easy.
Final attachment of the knobs wouldn’t happen ’til after painting, but here’s a preview (check out the assembled one on the left). John used some of the leftover craft wood (that he had from the Plan B oven window frame) to cut some little arrows that would later get glued over the bolt head on each knob. But back to these in a minute.
Now that everything was constructed, we snuck it upstairs to the sunroom after Clara was asleep and primed the whole darn thing (after patching some holes with wood putty). It was actually not that bad since we were in priming and painting mode for our real kitchen too. Then it was painting time, and we did all those finishing touches like gluing in the oven plexiglass and adding hardware over the next 48 hours.
The rest of the finishing touches are easier to explain while looking at the “after” kitchen, so through the magic of the Internet we’ll fast forward a bit:
We primed and painted it using leftover paint that we already had. The top is our kitchen wall color (Sesame by Benjamin Moore) and the base is the same stuff we used for our office cabinets (Benjamin Moore’s Advance paint in Decorator’s White in a satin finish). We painted the inside of the pantry Sesame also, but did the oven in a medium grey thanks to a test pot of paint that we had leftover from grey-washing our living room beams (in Benjamin Moore’s Shaker Gray). It’s sort of hard to see in the pics, but in person the gray oven and the grellow cabinet are fun little details to help each side feel more defined.
To dress up the inside of the oven we used heavy duty velcro to hold up a simple tap light, so Clara can actually “turn the oven on” just by pushing it. We also found this black wire shelf (it’s actually one of those bottom-of-the-sink drying trays) at Target for $5. It definitely helps things feel more oven-ish in there.
Oh, and here’s what the plexi-glass looks like from the back. We just used some clear silicone caulk to adhere it to the backside. That keeps it in place, but is totally invisible from the front thanks to the blessing-in-disguise frame that John had to add. Three cheers for happy accidents along the way.
We also whipped up a last-minute shelf on the sink side when we realized that most of the play food Clara was getting from her grandparents (they sweetly offered to give play-kitchen-themed Christmas gifts, knowing what we had up our sleeves) would be dwarfed by one big open cabinet. She’s got the basics covered… soup, cereal, crackers, pasta, tuna, sugar, milk (oh wait, maybe this girl needs a fridge someday…).
We opted not to add a stovetop so that she’d have more flexible-to-use-for-other-stuff-too counter space (you know, for mixing and setting out dishes, etc). It has already been a handy choice because there’s room to house the play toaster her Grammy and Tom-Tom bought her for Christmas (yes, it’s kind of the cutest thing we’ve ever seen). But I did make her a makeshift hot plate of sorts, so she has one burner to play with (instead of four space-hogging circles). What does she use it for? To fry sandwiches, apparently.
All that little DIY hot plate entailed was buying a $5 trivet from Bed Bath & Beyond and a $4 round of wood from Michael’s (which I painted teal with leftover paint from this project) and then drilled into it in three spots (to allow the feet of the trivet to “sink” inside the wood round so it was nice and solid). Then I used a flat washer and a screw to hold the trivet into the round of wood from the center. Voila: instant burner.
Oh and I used little felt furniture feet on the bottom of my burner (to lift it up ever so slightly to keep it from scratching the counter) which you can sort of see in the picture below.
Here’s a closer look at the final oven knobs too. I sprayed them with leftover spray paint (Rustoleum’s Titanium Silver that we bought to test on our old kitchen hardware). It’s not a perfect match to the new shiny chrome door hardware ($5 each from Home Depot) and our sleek sink and faucet, but it’s close enough. And it sort of glitters, which is semi-adorable (new rule: every play kitchen should have at least one glittering element).
We actually bought three of those Home Depot door handles so that one could act as a towel bar on the side of the sink. Little details like that were kind of my favorite part. As for hatching this whole kitchen plan, John and I took Clara and Burger for a nice long walk and chatted about things we could add to “our kitchen” (didn’t want to spoil the play-kitchen surprise for Clara) which is how we came up with things like the towel bar, the wire rack, the oven tap light, all the other little details like those spinning knobs that we thought would make it Clara’s favorite thing ever. The brainstorming part of a project is always my favorite. So much possibility…
So now I think you’ve see just about every nook and cranny of this puppy (can you tell we’re proud of it?)…
So how about a budget breakdown?
- Secondhand cabinet (from the ReStore): $14
- Secondhand faucet & handle (also from the ReStore): $10
- Stainless sink bowl (from Target): $7
- Oven knobs and frame (from Ben Franklin craft store): $5
- Hinges for oven door (from Home Depot): $3
- Pre-cut plexiglass and wood trim for oven window (from Home Depot): $4
- Wire oven shelf (from Target): $5
- Tap light for the oven (from Home Depot): $2
- Wood counter, backsplash, and toe kick: $0 (already owned scrap lumber, but it might be $15 or so to buy it all)
- Trivet (from Bed Bath & beyond) and wood round (from Michael’s) for hot plate: $9
- Three hardware handles for oven, cabinet, and towel bar (from Home Depot): $15
- Primer and paint for counter, cabinets, and hot plate: $0 (already owned, but a few $4 paint testers would do the trick if you needed to buy it)
- Miscellaneous wood pantry items (by Plan Toys): $0 (Christmas gift from Grammy and Tom Tom, but they might cost around $15 if you were to buy them)
- Play toaster (also by Plan Toys): $0 (another super thoughtful gift from John’s parents!)
- Total project cost: $74
And as they say in the commercials, watching Clara play with what Santa brought her: priceless.
If only a certain larger kitchen were this easy to knock out. Oh well, I guess that’s the difference between one cabinet and 20 of them. But I gotta say that this little guy is getting a ton of action. Stuffed animals regularly get bathed in the sink, fake slices of lettuce and tomato get toasted, boxes of cereal and crackers get baked in the oven, and random cars, balls, and trains get stuffed into the pantry cabinet. It’s also really nice to have a little “Clara zone” shaping up along the living room wall right off of the kitchen (we moved it to the wall on the left side of her new desk after Christmas). Good stuff.
Oh and oddly enough, folks ask us all the time what we want to “parlay” this blog-thing into, and for the past few years we’ve never really known how to answer that question because we love blogging as-is (we don’t want a TV show or anything – ack, that makes us break out in hives – so, we’ve actually turned those opportunities down a few times). But I can honestly say that “designing” Clara’s desk and her play kitchen have been hugely amazing and fun projects for both of us. So for once I might have an answer the next time someone asks what sort of side projects we’d love to end up doing in a decade or two (right along with the blog of course, since YHL = our first baby). Designing cute and affordable kid furniture (which seems to be surprisingly hard to find for some reason) might just be the sweet spot. Ya never know, right? So I’m just putting that out there into the universe. Who knows where we’ll end up…
Ang says
Holy cow! VERY creative! I love it! Clara is too cute. :)
Meredith says
Oh my gosh! I’m so inlove with this. It’s so nice. Our neighbors got one of the dream kitchen plastic thingys over Christmas and it doesn’t even compare to how cute yours is! Clara is a lucky lady. Happy New Year!
Aimee says
Wow what a cute project. And you are absolutely right about kids furniture being super expensive. I’m not sure why when it’s all so tiny! But great job and love that video of Clara. I’m not sure what she was saying but she sure had a lot to say about her new play kitchen! Happy 2012, YHL!
Renee says
my favorite is her sweet little gibber-gabber voice……just so cute!
Kari says
Awwww!!!!!! I want a girl, and a little one at that! (13 year old boys wouldn’t be as impressed… lol). You guys did an AMAZING job! Her reaction was so cute :)
Kate says
This is my favorite blog post thus far. I have been following your blog ever since I stumbled upon it a few months ago and it has become a part of my daily routine every morning. Thank you! I love this idea and that you were able to make a kitchen custom-made for Clara and include such fun details. The best part is the video of Clara waking up Christmas morning to see what Santa brought her. Great work!
elz says
This is adorable. Great job! What a great transformation and a fun toy. My girls still play with their play kitchen 6 years after getting it!
Emily says
You guys are so creative! Your DIY play kitchen looks so much better than the Ikea version and it’s great that the colors coordinate with the big kitchen. I hope your new book has some more stuff like this in it. Good luck w/ meeting your deadline!
Marla says
cutest thing ever. this will be all over pinterest :) Happy New Year!
Erin says
OMG. Wow. Kudos to you both. Love love this idea! I’m really very impressed.
Erika says
Guys, this is fabulous. Please feel free to design all the toddler play furniture you want and give us the details.
Reenie says
That is soooo cute! How adorable is the video too. Love her expression with the balloon.
Karen J says
Very cute! Makes me very nostalgic for when my kids where that young. They (6 and 9 now) grow up so fast. Alex Toys makes cute “tabletop” kitchens for those who are more pressed for space.
I agree that there is a real shortage of well-designed, affordable kids furniture. And please make it multifunction furniture with storage! Not everyone has a large playroom to put gigantic toys in. Our kids’ rooms have always had to function as a sleeping, toy, library and study area.
Giulia says
super cute – really well done and I can’t believe you managed to DIY it along with all your other projects. We got our daughter a kitchen about the same age – she is 4.5 now and her brother almost 3 and they still play with it all the time. It’s a great toy that is super versatile and really has their imagination going.
KC says
Y’all deserve some type of “Parents of the Year” award. Your labors of love are just incredible. Clara is so blessed.
YoungHouseLove says
That’s so sweet of you to say! Thanks so much!
xo,
s
Kristi Lynn says
Oh. My. God. I watched the video and I was seriously tearing up! She is such a little sweetie! I have to make one for mine (maybe for her birthday). So cute!
Katied says
you guys + kitchens = magic!!!
ps. i hope you have time for a vacay soon, you deserve it :)
Chris says
Thanks for making my first day back at work post-holidays bearable. Hearing her babble and seeing that fantastic gift you MADE was the best.
Happy 2012.
Meaghan says
I am so impressed – you two continue to amaze and inspire me! That is the cutest little play kitchen I have EVER seen!
Happy New Year to you and your family!
Kristi @ Addicted 2 Decorating says
Adorable!!! That is far better than any store-bought kitchen you could have found. And I can’t believe the price! Good job, y’all.
Katie says
That is just about the cutest thing I have EVER seen! As a child I had a cardboard kitchen and I absolutely loved it…until my little brother dumped water all over it and it “melted”. :( Clara is a lucky little lady to have such creative, loving parents! Nice job!
Sarah @ Redhead in Ruffled Flats says
AMAZING! This may be my favorite thing you have DIY-ed ever! And that’s saying a lot since you two are DIY idols. Watching Clara see all the fun features warmed my heart. My hubby and I just got married in August and are holding out for a baby until I finish grad school and am teaching full-time, but we want a little kiddo so badly. This video didn’t help since you have the cutest daughter ever (seriously she talks so well and is so sweet – it makes the English teacher in me smile) and my hubby is a chef. In a couple years I plan on DIY-ing tons of cooking and teaching-related gifts for our future kiddos. Thanks for the inspiration!
P.S. – I would totally buy any kid toys you made – you should get on that ASAP, like as soon as you finish the book, the kitchen, more of your house, have another kid, etc. You know, right away. :P
karen says
soooooo adorable!! i love her kitchen.
clara is sooooooooo adorable!! she talks so much!! perfection!
Kerrie says
I LOVE THIS!! My favorite present that I got as a child was a wooden dollhouse for my barbies! “Santa” made it of course. It was two stories tall and four rooms… one with laminate flooring for the kitchen and three with carpet. It was one of a kind — well two of a kind actually because Santa made my friend one a year or two earlier. It was covered in a blanket because it was too big to wrap.
I can’t wait to give it to my daughter one day… I’m sure Clara will feel the same way!
rachel says
cutest. play kitchen. ever.
Alicia @ Sweet Ava Kate says
This is adorable, you two did an amazing job! I love all the details you added and so sneaky of you to quiz Clara on kitchen details/necessities! Santa would be proud! The video is precious! Happy New Year to all of you!
Chelsea Payne says
Love the kitchen!! Does your oven door hit the ground when opening it? My dad, husband and I built one for our little one this Christmas, but we can’t figure out how to stop the oven door from hitting the ground ( it hits the handle every time).
Thanks!
YoungHouseLove says
Ours is attached so there’s a lip of the door on the bottom that it sort of rests on (so it’s just shy of the handle hitting the floor). But we actually debated adding two ribbons (one stapled to each side of the door and the frame) to “catch” it if the lip didn’t hold it up. Maybe that’ll work for you?
xo,
s
Devon @ Green House, Good Life says
So there’s no risk that the oven door will fall on Clara’s little toes? That’s all I could think about when I saw the picture with the door open.
YoungHouseLove says
It sort of catches itself on it’s own lip so it can only open a little more than 90 degrees if that makes sense – so it probably has an inch or two of “clearance under it” (so her toes are safe!). Whew.
xo,
s
Kelly says
That might be one of the cleverest creations you two have ever pulled off! …how many people want to submit orders??
Nicole says
OMG! Clara has the best parents ever. That is cuter than any other kitchen I’ve seen on pinterest (no offense to others who have posted theirs – you still outdo me!). Hers just might rival yours!
Teresa @ wherelovemeetslife says
That little girl is one lucky lady :) Wow, I don’t know that you could have bought anything any more perfect. And the fact that she plays with it so much is just precious!
Paige says
SOOO awesome!! I love this idea…one of the cuter DIY kitchens I’ve seen…this almost makes me want to have a kid ;-)
Thais Bessa says
That is lovely! I would buy YHL children furniture!
My daughter got a kitchen for her first birthday and now, almost a year after it, she still loves it. It is for sure one of the few toys she never got tired of.
I know it is a bit to soon in light of the ongoing kitchen project, but when are you guys tackling her playroom? Or is it one of the secret projects for the book? :)
YoungHouseLove says
I think we might get to that in the summer or fall? Not sure since we don’t seem to have an immediate need for it since Clara still plays in rooms with us around to keep an eye on her.
xo,
s
Ashley@AttemptsAtDomestication says
That is the most awesome, cutest thing ever!! It makes me want to have children to surprise and make things for! I love the video and how excited she was running down the hall! :)
June says
you guys are the cutest and clever-est (is that a word??). and clara is so lucky!
Donna says
That is so cute! I wish my 13 year old was younger…and liked to cook! Oh maybe that’s why she doesn’t! Poor child never had a play kitchen! LOL
YoungHouseLove says
Haha- I never had one and I never cook! That explains it!
xo,
s
Laura@JourneyChic says
Wow – that’s amazing! Less expensive and SO much more attractive than traditional play kitchens. I’d actually be happy to have this one in my house. I’m sure my little guy would love something like this.
Heather M. says
That play kitchen is absolutely the cutest thing I have ever seen. Props to you two and your mad skills! : ) Can’t wait to see what else y’all come up with in the new year!
Laura says
This might be my most favorite post ever. So creative, and I loved the video of Christmas morning!!
LauraC says
Wow, cutest thing ever! Much better than the kitchen we designed for our daughter when she was two, but then we never got it completely finished. But we did a refrigerator as well, which I still love! We got our cabinets from the “as is” section at IKEA. I’m sending this post to my husband, so maybe we’ll be motivated to finish the oven (we have the stove top done)!
Maggie says
Man-ooooh-man….I want one! Love the idea and the total cost of the project! Thanks for sharing such great ideas and letting us glance at your family life!
Cheers,
Maggie
Lilly says
Oh I love u guys n Clara is so cute n smart, God bless that little girl she can talk, and talk clearly an cutely (I don’t even know if that’s a word) I love it (the kkitchen), that faucet is crazy cute I love that she can move it, she is going to play with that thing everyday. U guys must be so proud of making it for her I know the feeling It’s the happiest feeling ever. I can’t believe u guys, 72 hrs before christmas, really? We started a month before christmas n was still painting ang doing things like gluing on the sink the christmas eve. Everybody (our family) went nuts buying supplies for the kitchen n now she has more stuff than I do. I wish i could send u pics but I don’t even know the first thing about blogging or anything. If u know of an easy way to send pics to u please let me know I would love for u guys to c it afterall u r my biggest inspiration for all of our home transformations not that my house looks anything like urs but budget finds, cabinet painting, hanging curtains n stuff like that. Happy New Years guys.
YoungHouseLove says
Aw, we’d love to see pics! Feel free to use the contact us link on the sidebar (on the button with our smiling mugs on it) or submit them to facebook! Or you can link to them on a site like Flickr from here so we can all hop over and see stuff!
xo,
s
Katie says
you GUYS! This is amazing!! I would 100% buy a play kitchen handmade by you, so that is definitely a really good path for y’all to take! Awesome work.
The video made me SO excited for Christmas with our little one, who isn’t even born yet. Love it.
Jessica D says
What an adorable video of an adorable little girl! Thanks for sharing! This made my first day back at work so much better and brighter!
sarah @ sarah learns says
best christmas present ever. this post was so cute! :)
Ashley Ez says
Cute! Clara is SUCH a good little talker! Yall are great parents and the kitchen is to die for!
Sarah R. says
I think it’s great when parents build something like this for their kids (no disrespect to those who don’t/can’t build stuff). It would have been easier to buy something from Ikea or whatever, but making it yourself is special and will probably mean more to her over the years. My dad built a treehouse for my brothers and me when we were little – he even did it at night, after we were in bed, so we could be surprised when we woke up in the morning. I cried when it had to come down a couple decades later.
Kelly Ray says
Wow! You guys are awesome! What a special thing for Clara to keep as she gets older and to remember how much love went into making it! This is such a cool project. Thanks for sharing!
Regan @ RenovatingRothenbergers says
That is the sweetest play kitchen I have every seen. Even better that you put so much thought & love in to it. I don’t have any kiddos yet, but I’d totally buy some play furniture from you when the time comes! :)
Deb D. says
ADORABLE! Can’t figure out how you all do as much as you do. Are you hiding an army of “assistants” somewhere (a la Martha Stewart) because you make the rest of us parents looks like slouches!! Totally inspiring.
YoungHouseLove says
Haha- I wish we had a little army of elves over here! We’ve just decided not to sleep until the manuscript is handed in on the 4th! It’s amazing what you can do at 2 in the morning. Haha. Although not terribly self-sustaining (good thing we only have 24 hours until we hand in the book copy!). Then we might sleep for a week…
xo,
s
elaine says
That is one of the cutest things I’ve ever seen! Both the kitchen and Clara checking it out (and talking!). Great job guys! And I agree, cute kid stuff is in short supply! Love the kitchen!!!