New knobs

We had new, dark brown countertops installed in our kitchen last year, but we kept our old yellow pine cabinets. The color contrast turned out to be a little rough on the eyes, and the white porcelain knobs didn't help (although they had gone well with the previous dark green formica). We looked into replacing the knobs, but the ones we liked were beyond what we were willing to spend. Then it occurred to me that I'm a potter and I could probably figure out how to make whatever kind of knobs we wanted. So I did.

Here's what we had until last night:

The color combo reminded me a bit of the day in 1986 when I went to a physics class wearing an Oxford blue shirt and magenta corduroys and found the color combination so unnerving that I had to go home between classes to change.

Ugh

This was still during my post-back-brace limited-wardrobe-competence decade, when I was just so glad to find a pair of pants that fit, that my entire pants collection consisted of five pairs of the same style in five different colors (dark blue, gray, tan, olive green, and magenta). I figured any one pair was just as functional as any other, and all five corduroys were interchangeable; add a flannel shirt, and I was dressed in the official team uniform of the physics majors at Illinois. Then came that fateful Oxford blue/magenta day when I suddenly discovered I hate magenta. Anyway, the dark brown/yellow/white kitchen countertop/cabinet/knob combo reminded me a little of that.

Here's the new combo:

The cabinets are still yellow, of course, but now the knobs match the countertops pretty well. We have a grand Once-the-Cat-Is-Dead plan to lightly sand the cabinets, which should soften the color, but it will probably be a few years before we can implement the plan because we have very durable cats.

Every knob is decorated differently, so as a group they look intentionally mismatched.

The one below is on a drawer next to where we feed the cats, so that Homer and Schroeder can see that we love them dearly, despite the Once-the-Cat-Is-Dead plan (of which we have spoken nary a word to either cat).

In retrospect, I'm wishing I had made one with a gnu on it, so I could title this post "New gnu knob." All's 20/20 in hindsight.