Progress in the kitchen at least

I didn't get half as much done as I hoped today.  The kitchen kit came with Lydia Pickett 'leafy green tile' wallpaper by the Betterleys, which had been copied and reduced for the doors on the cupboards.  At first I wasn't sure whether I would use this because it would commit me to green for the room but it is just too pretty not to use. As I said yesterday, I had decided to paint the kitchen and today I painted the walls and the interior side of the kitchen bay window pieces with a pale green and the effect was - quite awful to be frank!  I gave it a couple more coats and it looked better but was too dark.  So I lightened it and did a few more coats of paint.  Finally the coverage is reasonable but not as good as I would like.  And it is still darker than I would like too but since there's not going to be too much of it showing I won't keep adding more and more layers.

The floor in the kit is also tiled with a Lydia Picket wallpaper, and I will order some and decide whether to use it in my kitchen.

While each coat on the walls was drying I worked on the kitchen cabinets.  Several coats of paint on the upper unit and it is ready - at least as far as I can go until I put the display items in the shelves.

I spray painted the clear plastic sink with white and left it to dry while I did the counter tops. I gave these a coat of light green, then sponged them with a medium then a darker shade of the same colour, Wedgewood Blue and light ivory.  I then dabbed at them with a small stiff-bristled brush with the different colours until I was happy with the results.  When they were dry I did a coat of flat varnish.

The sink could then be inserted into the sink benchtop and that is ready to attach to the sink module when I add the items to the small shelves on the end and put the little railings around them.  I won't put them on first because that will make it difficult to add things into the shelves.  In this photo the top is just sitting on the unit.

The oven graphic needed a bit of cut and paste to fit into the area I had on the front of the stove unit but it worked out well.  I stuck the stove graphic on the benchtop and then found I had done it with the benchtop the wrong way around so I was very pleased indeed that I had varnished the top.  It made it easier to remove the graphic, though it still looks a bit worse for wear.  It now just needs a tiled back between it and the top cupboards.

I spent a fair bit of time considering what I would do with the tall unit that has the fridge in it.  I wasn't sure whether to use the paper supplied to front the fridge or to paint it white to match the sink and oven front.  In the end I decided to go with the paper supplied.  I covered up the shelves on the left except for the lowest one with a bit of balsa, and cut and will cut and glue some left-over trim to make a door frame on it.

It doesn't look much in that photo but when the pieces are put together they look much better

And it will look even better with the trim on the wood between the fridge and the wall units, the knobs on the cupboards etc.

To break things up a bit I decided to work on one of the half scale furniture kits I have collected.  This one is a simple hutch from MJ Miniatures that I bought some time ago, when there was a sale of half scale items.  I thought there might be a possibility of using it in the Fairfield somewhere, even if not in the kitchen.

It actually fits really well in the corner beside the bay window, though that is where I had planned to put a pantry to replace the one I have removed from the tall unit with the fridge.

Looking at the room with the bay window dry fitted again, and the sink unit in place it occurred to me that the nice little shelves on the end will be difficult to see when the small wall is in place at the end of the kitchen.  I have put a bit of an overhang on the sink unit benchtop, to make full use of the area available, and was thinking that it would be a good spot to put a kitchen bin or something.  But perhaps if the shelves are too hard to see when the walls are on, I might need to trim the benchtop level with the sink module.  My poor mini lady won't be happy about losing the work area I know, but the shelves need to be seen!

Meanwhile, yesterday I started cladding the front right side wall as well.  But more about that soon!  Hope you tell me what you think of the kitchen - and maybe you might be able to tell me where I can find some really nice, good quality and realistic half-scale accessories such as a toaster, blender, coffee machine, modern kettle etc to jazz up the kitchen.  Hope to hear from lots of you!