Play Kitchen

Shh, don't tell Charlotte but part of her Christmas loot this year includes a play kitchen. It's a small, simple little kitchen that I found on sale last summer when she was just a few weeks old. I've been keeping it hidden, in the box, in her closet ever since.

The box is fairly big and the kitchen is not, so I assumed that it was either completely put together or in two (maybe three?) pieces.

I was incorrect.

I'm glad I checked because I was going to just leave it in the box until Christmas Eve and take it out before bed, stick a bow on it, and set it by the tree for Charlotte to find in the morning. I was more than a little surprised to find 14,756 pieces (approximately) that were all attached to one another in sheets of conjoined parts, along with two bags of different sized screws.

This was just the first page.

Fantastic.

I started assembling the kitchen at about 7:45 that evening and was finished around 9:30. Not too bad, and for the most part without frustration, but still. It wasn't necessarily how I'd choose to spend my Friday evening, but then again, had I gone with my original plan that's how I would've spent Christmas Eve.

The kitchen is pretty basic, which is perfect for her age. It takes up a small amount of space and doesn't light up or make any sounds--both pluses in my book. But on the downside it's kind of...boring. It's just a lot of beige, and some blue. Blah. Not that she cares, but still. So I decided to jazz it up with a little bit  of color and make some Charlotte-sized pot holders. This was a perfect use for some of my fabric scraps and only took about fifteen minutes.

The pot holders are made from two charm packs each, plus a small scrap of ribbon for the hook. I also used a piece of 5"x5" cotton batting in each of them.

And last but not least, we bought her a set of "food" for her play kitchen:

Click here for image source (we'd already wrapped her set, otherwise I would've taken my own photo!)

I had to hurry up and hide the kitchen back in the attic before she comes home, otherwise her little eyes would light up and there'd be no way we could take her present back for another two weeks. 

So I guess this means we now have two kitchens in our house. And only one of them is clean...

~Stacy