Built-in Refrigerator

Happy Friday! Today I woke up to an unexpected three day weekend due to a snow day from work so I got to spend my day in my PJs catching up on my DVR and daytime TV. I think I needed today more than I realized as I feel rested for the first time in weeks.

It has bothered me that you walk right in to the side of the fridge when you enter the kitchen since we moved in. I told J I wanted him to build it in and he laughed at me. Then I showed him how Young House Love did it and he jumped on board. I am actually pretty sure he was way more excited about doing it than I was in the end. 

Last weekend we finally got enough time to start and finish building in our fridge.
Our adventure started off with buying a $20 cabinet from the Habitat for Humanity Restore in Indy. This was my first time here and I have to say that I was impressed. My lovely nieces helped us pick a cabinet. I'm teaching them young.

Next, we let the cabinet sit in the garage for a month... This is key ;)

We could not find a cabinet that was tall enough to reach the top of our cabinets so we had to be creative.

We finally decided that these winos could really use some wine storage. We used plans from Lowes  and modified them to a make it a double wine rack.

We attached the wine rack to the cabinet with screws.

It was then finally time to attach the sides. The sides are actually just high quality plywood, also from Lowes.

We added a support piece of wood in the back to keep things straight and to have something to attach to the wall up top.

We also added a pine trim piece to the front of the sides and the to the wine box to make everything even and smooth. We just did this with the nailgun.

Then we did the typical, sand, prime, paint routine. Piece of advice: Paint the wine box before putting it together.

To prep to move it into the house, we ripped off the baseboards and quarter round behind the fridge and the crown molding on the cabinet next to the fridge. 

Now we had to figure out how in the world to move it into the kitchen. This baby is awkward and heavy. Once in, we slide it over the fridge and  pushed it flush against the cabinets. We attached it to the cabinets on the sides and to the wall via the wood support piece in the back. It took more time than I had imagined to make sure everything was straight and level. We used some woodshims at the bottom to make it perfectly level.

Jacob installed the crown molding on the top, the quarter round on the side bottom, and a tiny piece of baseboard on the back wall. We also added a little piece of trim between the new cabinet and the upper cabinets as there was a little gap. 

Obviously, the thrift store find doors did not match our current kitchen cabinets and I wanted the new cabinet to look like it had always been there. Luckily, the previous owners had left behind two extra cabinet doors and even hinges and hardware.  

The doors were far to big for the small little cabinet so Jacob basically cut the middle out of each door and then put them back together with liquid nails, filled the gap in with wood filler, primed, and painted.

Next we attached the doors and called it quits. Just kidding...

It's a law in our world that when we think we are done, the very last thing will go wrong, so what happened next did not surprise me. When we put on the new doors there was a teeny tiny little gap between the door and the middle of the cabinets because the new hinges moved the door over about 1/4 inch. To fix this, Jacob sawed out the middle piece of wood between the doors and replaced it with a wider piece of wood he found in the garage. We painted that piece, caulked, did some touch ups and now we can call it 100% done!

It's a huge improvement in my opinion and I think J loves it even more than me.

The best part is that I need to buy lots more wine!

Linking up to the Pinterest Challenge with Young House Love, The Remodeled Life, Bower Power, and Decor and the Dog