Remove items from cabinets and litter them haphazardly around the house.
(This project will only take a couple days so there’s no need for forethought here.)
Dismantle cabinets
(Throw all of the hardware in a plastic grocery bag. Don’t label anything. Only people with OCD do that.)
Make the kitchen into a plastic fort! Tape plastic drop clothes to the walls and ceiling completely seal off the kitchen as you will be filling it with toxic saw dust.
(Note that your kitchen will be completely unusable throughout the sanding process. Motivate yourself to sand faster by purchasing lots of perishable food items before you begin the sanding process. You’ll be so happy you did once you finally get to open that fridge again.)
Sand till you drop! Everyday. Until it’s done.
(Neglect you family, interests, and friends. This may sound unreasonable but really it’s only going to take a couple of days. You’ll be done before you know it.)
Once you’ve finished sanding it’s time to sweep up the saw dust, vacuum everything from floor to ceiling, and wipe everything down with a damp cloth.
(You should now be on week 3 of your 2 day project, but you’ve totally cleaned everything so at least that’s over now. )
Take the plastic down.
(You’ll now notice that more dust had settled but thanks to the plastic it’s been contained in the kitchen.)
Go over everything with a vacuum again, and a wet cloth.
(Once you’ve completely finished note that the vacuum has served to distribute a thick layer of very fine sawdust all over the contents of your home. Literally everything. Including the plates, glasses, and utensils haphazardly strewn around your living room.)
Prime the kitchen
(If at all possible try to have family stay with you while you do this. You want them to see and smell all the ways that this project is dominating your existence.)
Time to pick a paint!
(Definitely don’t have a paint picked out and ready to go until you’ve been living in squalor for several weeks and are desperate to take home any paint of any color that might return some sense of normalcy to you life.)
Tape up everything in the kitchen and start painting.
(Make sure you have all of the trim finished before you realize that the paint you’ve chosen is grotesquely glossy and you can’t live with it.)
Select a new paint!
(Methodically compare and contrast paint samples.)
Paint as though this paint is the love of your life.
(That nagging doubt about the color you’ve chosen is just weakness of character. This paint represents your resolve to be confident and firm in your decision making. This paint is a statement about how comfortable you are with yourself and if you get a headache every time you look at it you’re probably just reacting to paint fumes and not the way it clashes with your floor.)
It’s now 72 hours since you’ve finished painting the entire kitchen and it’s time to come to terms with the fact that the color you’ve chosen is so aggressively peppy that you can’t comfortably enter the kitchen with your eyes open.
Select a paint that you used on a previous project.
(It’s like an 80’s romantic comedy where you realize that what you’ve been looking for has been right here all along. It’s calming, stable, and so understated you didn’t even consider it even though it’s %$^&ing painted on one of your walls already. Plus you still have a big already-paid-for gallon of it sitting on your floor.)
You’ve finished the cabinet frames again! For real this time! And it feels so good.
Remove the tape, wipe the dust from the cabinets and start washing dishes to put them back where they belong.
(This is the correct time to inspect your paint can more closely and see that it is in fact Flat Enamel and therefore not suitable for kitchen cabinets.)
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