Since the kitchen is often the heart of the home, it makes sense to decorate your kitchen in an appealing and comfortable style. One quick and easy way to spruce up a dated kitchen is to decorate it with the French country decorating style. Since turning your kitchen into a French country retreat is one of the current trends in kitchen decorating, there are plenty of wonderful accessories available.

Before you start to shop for your new French country kitchen, you will need to select your color scheme. While the original French country décor colors were blue and yellow, black and white or maroon and white colors are now being used, as well. Personally, I still prefer blue and yellow, but I like the traditional yellow kitchen walls. I used a pale golden yellow on the upper half of my walls and a darker golden yellow on the bottom half. The room looks bright and cheery without being obnoxiously yellow. I use blue accents in the room to complete the blue and yellow color scheme.

I bought new cabinets for my kitchen when I redecorated in the French country style, but that is because the cabinets that were there when I moved in were hand-built and weren't very well done. They also were literally falling off the wall. If I would have had sturdy cabinets that had usable shelving and the fronts were a bit shabby, I would have painted most of them and knocked out the inside panels of the rest and attached chicken wire to them instead. To do this, you simply cut a piece of chicken wire so it is slightly larger all around than the inside of the door. Then, bend the cut edges under so that you won't end up cutting yourself on the sharp edges. Finally, staple the wire to the inside of the door. Now, you have given your cabinet door a country look and you can display some of your favorite pottery, as well.

Once the cabinets are in place, it is time to fill your kitchen with a French country ambience. Rooster accessories are a hot trend that give your kitchen the right feel. I used a framed French country rooster print on one wall and a few rooster statues on a shelf over my kitchen doorway. A gold and blue rug with a rooster in the center to the floor helped draw the room's colors and décor together.

To finish off the room, I added a valance to my window made with a French country fabric print called moiré. I made matching seat cushions for the kitchen table.