A Simple Saturday

That is a lie.

Saturday was anything but simple! Exhausting and awesome, maybe...but simple, no! Matt accepted my challenge to teach me how to tile. As I have mentioned in previous posts, we have been doing some small, nothing crazy/expensive, home renovations lately. (i.e. repainting the door to the garage) We are focusing our efforts on the guest bath and the laundry room. Why? Because they are small so we can make a BIG, noticable difference without breaking our budget.

So Saturday we woke up, enjoyed our lattes and got dirty! Literally! 8, yes, 8 hours later my body hated me but we had the start of something beautiful! Matt tells me that this project is a nice little reality check for me because I just think all home projects are easy and can be done in minutes! Well between the work, the waiting, more work and more waiting...this will be a full week of a project.

Here is the breakdown:

Step 1: Take a picture of the "before." Please take note of the VERY white cabinets, door and trim! All recently repainted. Matt is finishing the doors to the cabinet, but that is another post.

Up close of the FABULOUS linoleum flooring we are about to rip up!

Pink spot under the washer that I SWEAR was there when we bought the house. Yucky! Also, that is where Lucky's kennel is so it is kind of dirty. I definitely swiffered before we started! Counterproductive? Maybe!

We wanted Lucky to be a part of the experience so we blocked her in so she wouldn't be roaming around the house all willy-nilly! 

 Step 2: Take the baseboards off. Goal is to get them off in one piece so you can easily put them back up. Our baseboards were nailed in like a hurricane was going to come through. Needless to say, 2 of the 4 did NOT come off in one piece. Oh well, Home Depot sells more!

Seriously, it is like no one took care of this room! Granted this is behind the washer, but still! I am SO excited to have brand new, white baseboards!

 Step 3: Rip up the linoleum. This is where the pain starts. Not. Easy! I think it took us 2 hours just to get all the stuff ripped up. The top layer came off really easily....the glue/paper stuck to the floor. Not. So. Much.

So close. You can notice on the left is where we are still working. 

Step 4: Lay out the tile
Step 5: Realize you are not being careful enough and break several pieces

 Step 6: Realize the tile cutter a friend let you borrow is NOT going to do the trick

Step 7: Go to Home Depot and rent a tile cutter. Get an extra set of slate because the stuff you have keeps breaking

Step 8: Freak out a bit because you wonder how a washer is going to sit on the slate without breaking it....EVEN though you asked everyone at Home Depot if it would work. 

Step 9: Have sweet husband talk you off the ledge.

Step 10: Eat lunch, refuel!

Just so handsome! The tile cutter was hilarious. By the end of it Matt was SOAKING in "crap."

Step 11: Start cutting the tile
Step 12: Realize you measured wrong
Step 13: Convince yourself it wasn't you, the tiles weren't all cut to the exact measurements
Step 14: Determine you did, in fact, measure wrong
Step 15:  Mix the morter

 Step 16: Start laying the morter and putting the tiles on

Step 17: Step on the tiles waiting to be "morted?" and break them

Repeat steps 8 and 9

Step 18: Figure out a way to make your measurements WORK (i.e. cut some smaller tiles and make it look like you did it on purpose

Step 19: RUN OUT OF TILES

Repeat step 9 - but in this case, wifey comes to the emotional rescue

Step 20: Run to Home Depot to get ONE LAST set of slate before the grout gets hard - Alex to the rescue to continue "morting"

Step 21: Look at your work of art and feel super proud
Step 22: Your body tells you it hates you
Step 23: Realize that you don't get to do the next step for 24 hours!

Matt has since done the grout and it looks amazing. I feel so proud of our accomplishment and think it is really fun that it is something we did together! Now we just have to wait 16 hours for the grout to set and  another 3 days for it to "set" before we put the sealer on in. Then the new baseboards come up, new cabinets, a little touch up paint and voila!

I was going to wait until it was completely finished, but like I said...that will be DAYS...so I figured I would share a sneak peak at our progress.