Tuesday, June 13, 2017

Out with the old part II

 Today is the day folks that you get the rest of the kitchen! Just kidding! Not yet, patience Iago. After the counter tops, came B's back splash. I say B's because I was totally indifferent to having one. B really wanted one and thought it would make the kitchen look a lot better. A lady that B works with, is married to a tile man. B asked her how much her husband would charge for a back splash. She told him between $500-$700. He doesn't buy any of the material either. So, we would be paying him for labor only. We had never priced out the materials needed for a back splash but we were sure that it wouldn't cost that much. We were right. All the tile and mud stuff and grout and caulking and spreader thing for the mud was a lot cheaper than tile man wanted to charge us. We were going to wait until the next Monday because B was on call for the weekend. He didn't want to start on the back splash and then get called in whilst he was working on it. Well, on Friday the guy from our ward that has helped us out a lot with projects around our house called B and asked when we were going to do the back splash. B told him that he was on call so we were just going to wait until Monday and start on it. This guy told B that he couldn't help us on Monday because he would be at work. B told him that was ok, we wanted to try and do it ourselves anyway and we didn't want to take him away from his family so we would just do it Monday. The nice fellow told B that that wasn't a great idea and that his wife and kids would love to spend the day at our house on Saturday and if B got called in, they would just finish the back splash for us. B tried to tell him no, that we really wanted to wait until Monday and he just wouldn't let it go. So, we ended up buying all of the supplies on Friday night, picking up the rented tile saw early Saturday morning and busting out the back splash.

 You might be shocked to know that in this here town that we live in, there's no tile store. There's a home depot, but if you have a question you never know what kind of answer you'll get from home depot. Anyway, the only reason we knew to sand the wall was because we called a tile store in northern Alaska and they told us that the wall has to be rough so the mud will stick. B was very excited to add a sander to his minuscule tool cluster. Looky there! A snippet of exposed counter top! Just a little taste of the amazing reveal to come!

A lot of the day was spent out using the tile saw. The guy in our ward told us to just buy one. He's crazy. Do people in real life just go out and buy a saw? We've noticed that saw's are not inexpensive so renting one for $30 was the way to go!

Putting the mud on the wall. Ok, confession time. I don't really know if it's called mud. I just try to sound like I know what in the world I'm talking about but honestly, I usually don't. 

Pushing the tile onto the wall. We really thought that we would be able to bust this back splash out in about half a day. We got the bigger tile thinking that it would take less cutting and we would be able to just line them up. Ya, it took a lot longer than we thought. B was so thankful that P from our ward had insisted on helping us. He helped a ton and when one brain would get stuck on how to measure for a tile to make it look good, the other brain would come get involved and they would figure it out.

Trying to figure something out. This little section of the wall took for-ever! Truly, hours were spent trying to figure out how to line them up and make the right cuts around the bottom of the cabinets and around the window. While they did the back splash, I was in charge of taking pictures, taking care of the littles, making the working men lunch and talking to the lovely folk that were driving down our street and got hit when our amazing oldest son went flying off the sidewalk on his bike and rode right into the side of their car. Thankfully the lady had noticed K and had come to a complete stop so he hit a stopped car. But, he hit them hard enough that he flipped over the front of his bike and landed on the ground. He smashed their headlight and left a tire mark on the side of their car. Needless to say we are so so thankful that he didn't get hurt and that the lady wasn't flying down the street like so many cars do.

This was a wonky angle. They had to go around the outlet and the window. It took more than one attempt to figure out the template. I think it's a stroke of genius to use paper to make a template so that they didn't waste tile after tile trying to get the angles right.

We had to wait two days for the tiles to set before B could grout it all.We were virgin grout mixers and like so many other things, it took us awhile to figure it out. But, after the second or third time, we were professionals! He was able to smash the grout in where it sat drying for a day.

After the grout had dried, he was able to caulk it. Once he was done with that, I went through and sealed the grout. Now, hold your breath, here it comes!

Doesn't it look so lovely?! Ok, I know that with those awful honey oak cabinets that it doesn't look that great. But we aren't done yet peeps. I bet you can imagine what the last step to our kitchen fix is. You guessed it! Cabinets! But that post will have to wait. Don't lose faith in me yet, there's still one more picture that I can hardly wait to show you!









1 comment:

  1. Looking A-mazing! Can't wait to come back and see it all in person. And so so so grateful K is ok!!!

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