Kitchen Reno - Getting our Tile on!

***this post has been waiting to be finished for over a week, but with the start of the school year fo both kids plus my own grad school class starting up, blog stuff got shifted to the back burner...progress is happening though and that's the important thing!***

 WOOT WOOT!  Floor time!

I may have mentioned this before, but in case you don't recall, when we pulled out the floor in the kitchen, we found no fewer than four layers of flooring piled one on top of another.  Sometimes with a layer of luan in there for good measure.  I guess if you're just doing vinyl flooring then slapping it down over the existing floor is the quick & easy way to go, but since we wanted something else and because the existing floor had gotten higher than the hardwoods in the adjacent rooms, the old stuff had to go.

There were a few options to choose from when considering kitchen flooring.  One thing we thought about was doing hardwood to match the rest of the house.  The only big concern we had with that was how to work it from the kitchen to the dining room, it would have involved pulling some planks up and putting new ones down.  Color matching would have also been an issue.  We also considered some sort of cork flooring.  I had seen it a few places and thought it looked fantastic, but the process was about as involved as hard-wood would have been, so we decided to look at the third option - tile.  Tile is something Jason has done before (2 bathrooms) so it's something we KNOW we could handle.  

We visited our favorite tile shop (if you're in southeast PA, check out Orlandini Tile in Marcus Hook) and saw tons of gorgeous options.  We fell in love with these wood look tiles and brought home a few samples to choose from.  I highly encourage you to bring home samples to lay down on your floor before making a final decision.  See how it looks in the room - does the light make it look lighter/darker?  does the paint make it look bluer or greenish?  I changed my mind at least twice by looking at different samples at different times of day.

Finally we went with one called "Newport Charcoal" -- it's got sort of a gray-ish tan thing going on.  It reminds me a bit of driftwood.  It's porcelain tile, so it'll be durable and easy to clean.  Both good features.   

Up until this point we had been able to get by in the renovation process without totally emptying the room.  We still had our stove & fridge in place, but when you're working on the floor, empty is best.  So the fridge moved to the dining room and the stove moved to the back porch.  If you have to do these sorts of things, don't underestimate the time it takes.  For the fridge we had to take the doors off and and put them back on and for the stove we had to deconstruct part of the back deck so we could take out the sliding glass doors.  

Finally, we got down to actually starting on the floor.  The first step was to lay down some concrete backer board.  This board had to be put down with thinset AND screws.  It was a pretty straightforward process but it took a while (and the drill is very tired).  This took the better part of two weekends.

After that we determined the tile layout.  There's two big options:  pattern or random.  I liked a simple offset pattern for this tile, so we went with an 8" offset, so with 24" tiles, the pattern repeats every 3 rows.  We also spent some time figuring out the starting point of the pattern - we looked at how the tiles would line up with the doors and the other end of the room.  We didn't want a seam right in the middle of the doorway and we didn't want to be finishing courses of tile with skinny slivers.   It's not a huge deal, but we just wanted things to look right.

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Once the layout was decided, Jason cut tiles for a few rows.  It's a good idea to "dry fit" your tiles to make sure you're not stuck with a bunch of wet thinset and tiles that don't fit right.  We already had a wet saw, but they're not terribly expensive (about $100) and they are also available to rent at Home Depot or Lowes.   Layout was a pretty straightforward process.  The little white "X"s are spacers.  They're used to maintain an even grout line between the tiles.  We went with 1/8" spacers.  It's a pretty small grout line, but we liked the look. Tiling took 2 weekends.  The first weekend we were able to lay about 1/2 of the tile.  Midweek, Jason put down a bit more and the last of it was laid on the second Saturday morning.  

Grouting started the same afternoon.  Grouting is a bit of a process - you put the grout down and really work it into the joints and then you have to come back and wipe the excess with water.  We ended up spending most of Saturday night wiping grout and there are a few places where there's set up grout in the textured "grain" of the tile, but overall I'm super happy with the floor.  It's exactly what we hoped for!
Let's take a quick look at what we started with in the kitchen:

And here's how things are now:

Next up:  CABINETS!!!  

Kitchen Reno: Meet the Kitchen

We have lived in this house for about 6 years now and the kitchen has been this one big ugly eyesore. It's a bigger renovation than either of the bathrooms, and yet as ugly as it is, it's been "serviceable" - meaning that we got new appliances and there's basically enough storage for our needs.  Only not really.
Let's take a look at it and talk about the problems - keep in mind that these photos are from our first day in the house.

Stove/oven - We got a new stove about 5 years ago and we really like it - it's black/stainless (not that awesome brown one in the picture).  Pretty much everything else you see here will be removed.  Yeah, we don't really dig the brown hood/vent so we'll probably replace it with a microwave vent.  It will cost us a bit of over-the-stove storage, but we'll make up for it in counter space. Also see that sweet brown plaid backsplash?  Yeah, that's gonna go too.
Sink/dishwasher - We will be replacing the dishwasher - we replaced the brown one shortly after moving in, but it's had a happy life and the interior racks are rusting.  I'll put it on CL and maybe get $20 for it because it does work.  We may be relocating it to the opposite side of the sink though.  In its place we'll have a nice cabinet and/or bank of drawers.  It'll be good.  

Fridge - We will also get a new fridge.  We got a new fridge - a stainless side-by-side and it is only 6 years old so we'll be CL-ing it for sure.  The fridge is great but it's just not working for us.  The position of the fridge next to the wall makes it so that the fridge door doesn't fully open.  It's really annoying, actually.  The best decision we made so far was to relocate the fridge to the other side of the room and to have the cabinets wrap around the corner.  We'll get more cabinet AND counter space.  But we'll need a different fridge.
Back side - To add functional space in our kitchen, we got a butcher-block island/counter from Ikea.  It's really great, but our new kitchen design puts the fridge - a new counter-depth fridge over here.  And we'll have tall pantry cabinets on either side of that.  
Sliding doors - NEW!  The current doors are in rough shape.  The handle falls off, the lock doesn't work, the screens jump the tracks and are all ripped.  The best way to go is to just do a full-on replacement.  
So what's it gonna look like?  We're thinking white cabinets, probably a blue/green tinged composite counter, a dark cork flooring, and some to-be-determined tile backsplash.  We don't have much paint, but that will be a light color that will coordinate with the counters or tile.  Floors are still a question - maybe dark cork?
I'm pretty excited.  We are in the very early stages here, but it's going to be great!    

A Big Girl's Bedroom - Update 11/8

 

 

Wow, looking back, I can't believe it's been over a month since we last had an update on this space!  We have made a ton of progress, but truth be told, there's still a lot to do in here. 

 

I'll give a quick rundown of what we've done so far and what's left...

 

What's Done:

1. Clear the room
2. Wall repairs
3. Rebuilding the closet
4. Baseboards!
5. Prime & paint
6. New rug
7. Closet build-out
8. Moving in

 

What's Left?

1. Curtains!
2. Art work
3. Play Area
4. Bed - repairs & repaint
5. Dresser refurb 
6. Bookshelf paint job
7. Hang a mirror
8. Finish closet - needs a shelf across the whole thing

Let's take a quick peek at a few pics -

 

 The closet will get a curtain and a shelf.  I'd love to get some new bins/baskets for the closet eventually.  And a basket or something for the bottom of the closet for shoes.

 

 

 

We need to get her bed back in the room and put up curtains.  And I'd LOVE to figure out something to do with all the stuffed animals.  I think we really just need to thin the herd a bit.

 

 

These dressers need some love as does the bookshelf.  And I think we'll do a gallery wall here or maybe find a large-scale wall decal.

There's still a ton to do, and it's seriously cluttered.  I know that I want this room to be "magazine gorgeous" in the end, but I need to remember that it's a room for a Kindergartener and it will definitely reflect her tastes and sense of style (her style being general chaos).

Well, that's pretty much it!  I'm looking forward to sharing the rest of the changes to this room as soon as they happen!

 

A Blast from the Past - Powder Room

Let's be kind and say the "before" look of our powder room was "vintage".

Yep, there was a vanity with a yellow basin and a matching yellow toilet, there was a mirror with 2 sconces built-in, and a louvered window.  Wallpaper and white-ish paneling finished up the look.  I honestly don't remember what the floor looked like, but I think it was vinyl.  Whatever it was, it had to go.

So here's how the timeline went - we bought the house in January 2007 and before we moved in the room was gutted to studs figuring that it was a small bathroom and the re-do would be quick and cheap-ish.  The sad truth is that the room remained gutted and used for storage (which was very handy, actually) until spring of 2011.  It's not that we weren't busy during that time - there were many other projects that happened, but I'll  be honest and say that we sat on this one longer than necessary.

Step one was drywall and we decided to go with bead board wainscoting.  With the small scale of the bathroom we thought that breaking up the wall would make it more comfortable since the wall is up in your face when you're, um....going.


For the walls I went with a color called "Lemon Meringue" and we used "Linen White" for the trim & ceiling.

I picked out a cobalt blue pool tile for the floor - why pool tile?  Because I liked it.  The sales woman at the tile store was very nervous about the choice and tried to talk me out of it.  She said it might be slippery or it might not hold up.  So far so good!

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I'll chime in on Jason's behalf here - he's the tile guy at our house and the installation in this room was fast.  Like over a weekend and BAM DONE!

The faucet was a Home Depot find - and I wanted a shiny finish to contrast with the more casual/country-ish bead board.  The mirror is from Ikea, and I like how it's shiny and round - again a contrast with the casual/country feel of the bead board.

What's left in here?  I'd love a little cabinet or covered basket to store extra TP.   I think the room needs a bit of artwork.  And the curtain needs to be sewn properly.

Other than that it's done and we really enjoy a bright clean and fresh space.

Link-Ups:

Twirl & Take A Bow @ House On The Way

{Im}Perfect Sundays @ Violet Imperfection

A Big Girl's Bedroom - Update 10/2

Wow - so it's been a while since I gave an update on the bedroom re-do.  And there's a lot to update on:

• Baseboards: done
• Door casing: done
• Closet: nearly done (just a shelf is left to put up - I'll do a post on it when it's totally done)
• Shades: done
• Ceiling paint: done

We're so close to some sort of final reveal I can taste it!  So now it's time to shift from DIY home improvement to more decor related stuff.

Let's talk flooring for a minute.  The first floor of our house has great hardwood floors.  We put them in before we moved in 5.5 years ago.  We like to cover the floors to protect them and to give a soft feel underfoot.  It also dampens sound.  For Sarah's bedroom we wanted a soft, plush feeling carpet in a neutral color.  The best option for us was to go with a carpet remnant - inexpensive, neutral, and soft.

Remnants are available at many places including big box stores like Hope Depot.  I decided to check out a local carpet retailer and by calling ahead I was able to confirm that they did have remnants in our desired size (8'x10') and many with bound edges.  The bound edges were important to me because it really gives the rug a more finished look.  So after Kindergarten pickup the kids and I went in to see what they had.  And there were tons!  Immediately I was able to rule out lime green, bright orange, and leopard print.
We decided against white because while it would be gorgeous, it would only be white for about 20 minutes before dirty kid and/or beagle feet made their mark.  The two best fits were beige or gray.  Both options were textured.  I decided not to bring one home on Friday because I wanted Jason's opinion and because I needed him to carry it :)

We came back on Saturday and decided on the gray, but unfortunately we couldn't get a pad until Monday.  It's a bit of a delay in our plans as we were hoping to get Sarah moved in this weekend.  We rolled out the rug to let it settle and unwrinkle a bit.

Here's a quick reminder of how things started out:

And here's the closet view with the rug laid out!

I think it looks great - and I think Sarah likes it too.  She actually spent some time playing back there on the floor.  Clean, soft, and dirt-hiding.  Just right.

Coming soon - FURNITURE!

(Kinda scary looking, right?)

Here are links to some other big-girl-bedroom posts:

• Project Intro
• Sharing Some Inspiration
• The Plan
• The Clean Slate
• Closet Demo
• PAINT!
• Trimming it Out