Backsplash — Intimidating?

Before we put our last house on the market, we had a small repair that had to be done. The house was in pristine shape—we had really cared for it! But the tile in the master bathroom hadn't been installed correctly by the builder and a majority of it had come loose over the five years we lived there. Some of the tiles were basically just resting on the floor. Well, the tile guy wanted $1,700 to repair it, and we knew we wouldn't recoup that cost. So, my ever awesomely-helpful father helped me rip up the floor, save the tiles, and re-set and re-grout them. Two days on our hands and knees.

I say all this because I kind of work the "see one, do one, teach one" model when it comes to home projects. Generally speaking, my dad shows me how to do the first project, and the second one is on my own. I haven't taught a whole lot yet, but my day is coming! So, in my mind, floor tile and backsplash are all tile. So, clearly this one is a solo event!

Guess what? Mosaic tile is a lot easier than floor tile! Now, my disclaimer is that this assessment is solely based on my experience with my particular mosaic. It's not based on a standard tile. 

Here is my tile. 

The thing I didn't plan on is that my mosaic has three different heights on the tile. There also appears to be three (maybe four?) different versions of the tile (which I didn't know until I started installing—whoops!) Not crazy ridiculous but certainly more complicated! Except that means there really isn't a pattern! Yay! Nothing to mess up!

When we re-tiled the bathroom floor we used a pre-mixed mortar, but my research said it's a bad idea to use the pre-mixed stuff on glass tile. Apparently it tends to discolor over time. So, I got this big bag from Floor & Decor where I bought the tile...and then I read the bag. It said nothing about glass tile. It said a lot about heavy large tile. I got cold feet and ran to Home Depot for this glass tile mortar. I don't know if it's superior, but it's white and it works. Of course, half way through my first wall, my contractor (who was working on the shower upstairs) says, "I've got extra mortar. Do you want it?" And he dumps his perfectly mixed thin mortar into my bucket. Messier than my thick slop, but I learned a little something! 

I did the bar first...and honestly, I wish I had done it last. But that's okay! I opted not to get a tile saw. Could I have used one? Yes. Did I need one? No. I used these awesome glass tile cutters that did a great job! One thing I also realized is that the texture on the tile actually offered a lot more wiggle room for me as well because imperfect cuts aren't massively obvious. I also don't actually need any spacers. The mosaic fits together perfectly and extra pieces just pop into place. I occasionally needed something to lift a sagging fill-in piece but not often. I did get these little lifts to help keep them from settling onto the counter, and that turned out to be a great plan on my part! All things I really hadn't considered when I picked my tile! Glad I didn't go with subway tile! But I'm sure it would have equally had its own quirks. 

This was definitely a time-consuming project, and would have gone a lot faster with a second set of hands. But honestly, it wasn't hard. What was hard was when my babysitters weren't available and my husband went out of town for work, and I needed to finish installing the tile. My kids rock. A Chick-Fil-A breakfast and working 10am - 6pm. There were snacks. But tiling while yelling, "Do not run in the house!" and "Let me just finish this part right here!" is nothing in comparison to "I ran out of mortar and have four square feet left to install! We're going to Home Depot!" and having to promise suckers. But they did let me finish. Bless them. ❤️️

The down side to spending so much time up-close-and-personal with my walls... the realization that not all of my wall sockets are white. Ugh. This was before I grabbed one of those live wires by accident (you're supposed to turn off the breaker, but I like living on the edge!) 😜 don't do what I do. Be safe. Turn off the breaker. But of course this meant changing out all the outlets. Not hard but not what I had planned. Not fun.
Had to use these outlet spacers when I put the outlets back on... again... not hard. Just not fun.
Overall, tiling isn't all that bad. I kind of liked it. I'd do it again. Floors hurt your back a little more than kitchen backsplash, but many floors are a lot smaller!!

The Kitchen Island

I promise, pictures of the whole kitchen are coming sooooon. But I painted it, and then decided I didn't like the color and just painted again. The details are killing me ya'll! That, and I don't constantly work on our house, of course! So, today... I give you...THE ISLAND.

Oooohhh, the island! This has been my favorite project so far. Maybe because it's been much easier than I thought it would be! It also seems like a big deal because it's a giant piece of the kitchen in the middle of the room! My island went from a very small 4ft x 2ft island that just didn't make any sense for the size and space in the kitchen... to a whopping 7.4ft x 3.4ft island with an overhang for stools.

To make things simple, I bought a prefab base cabinet. It felt like cheating, but in the interest of time, it was actually the best idea I've had. I just screwed them together in the front, but the back had a small gap because the front of the cabinets stuck out on the sides. The gap was just big enough for a piece of base molding I had left over from my cabinet project. Maybe not the most professional shim, but it worked! Then, I went to Home Depot and had them cut a piece of plywood to fit across the back of both cabinets. Perfect fit! The minute it went on, it looked like one cohesive island. At that point, I started to realize my plan was actually going to work. But I didn't want just a cohesive island... I wanted a pretty one! I put my 1x4s and my trim pieces on the ends to match my cabinets. I want the end result to at least look like "custom cabinets" even if they aren't.

The new cabinet was slightly off at the bottom and I had to add a 1x4 so that I could put the base molding on. But...lesson learned... don't pull pieces of flimsy pre-fab board off the baseboard and toss it if you aren't absolutely SURE you won't need it. You might end up being like me and have to cut plywood to go across the front before you put on the molding. It's not pretty, and I'm glad no one will be looking under my cabinets.

Side note: I wish I had used MDF on my cabinets instead of the 1x4s. It would have required less sanding on my part.

Trim

The bane of my existence. Okay, not really. It's not difficult, but it's definitely time consuming. I'm not math-oriented. I have a journalism degree. Math... it's just not my thing... except when you're a DIYer. Then, it kind of has to be your thing. For instance, when you're standing in Home Depot and think, "I know exactly how long that island is! I'll just cut it in the store." Except, I didn't consider the fact that this is trim. Trim requires corners--not flat ends. So, back to my pre-existing problem of not buying enough trim.

But the back of the island needs some trim to cover the plywood too! But I had lofty ambitions of these rectangles across the back. Multiple rectangles means a lot of math. This was my original plan... and then what happened when I realized my drawing was pretty, but my math was all wrong. And even after all this, my math was still wrong, and I redid it another ten times. The good news is, it did eventually work and my fudged math looks pretty good.

Electrical

***Like all things electrical, flip the breaker off before you start working on it. Call an electrician if something isn't working right or you just don't think you can do it. It's not worth the risks of burning your house down or electrocution.***

The ends of my original island each had an electrical outlet. When I added the second cabinet, I covered one of my outlets...literally. Just forgot about it. Luckily I was able to pop the blue box back into the cabinet. But my wiring from the floor was now under my new cabinet. I wanted to minimize visible holes, so I made one through the base back toward the old cabinet. Then, I ran the wire back through the original hole.

I ended up talking to my dad about the best way to run the wire, and then talked to the guy at Home Depot about what I needed. He sent me home with everything. And then, I put in an outlet after that and discovered all I needed to know about wire gauges, and what was being used in my kitchen. I planned it out three more times and took everything back. I finally landed on this pre-wraped  wire that made everything easier to work with and kept it all neatly together. I then ran all the incoming wire to one box and split it out from there to my two outlets by drilling a hole through my middle walls. Then, the indimidatint part of cutting the outlet box in the side of my sparkling white Island. Seriously, that part was hard after all my hard work on this thing! I didn't want to fix any mistakes. But I did it! Worked out fine. Anchored all my wire to the walls and VOILA! I have this little outlet tester I use that I plugged in to check the outlet. Flipped on the breaker and...NOTHING. Nada. No power. I started thinking about how my island was already anchored down, and how I was going to need an electrician. Then, I realized my wine refridgerator wasn't on either and realized the GFCI had flipped. That's that little button on outlets in your kitchen and bathroom that flip when you do something stupid like overload the outlet or throw you hair dryer into running water. It also flipped when you flip the breaker. Pressed button. WE HAVE POWER!

Trash & Recycling

I remember being a kid at people's houses and discovering that some people keep their trash can hidden away in a cabinet. You know, the ones you have to ASK where their trash can is, and you know you've been to their house a lot of times when you already know where it is. It's an odd measure of friendship. But I always thought it was cool for some reason. And being on Pinterest doesn't help because I wanted mine to pull out or tip out or something "convenient" like that. To add to my plan, our recycling requires that we use these blue bags trash bags to hold our recycling. I don't like the idea of walking to the garage or laundry room to recycle, and if I'm going to hide my trash, I should hide my recycling too. I set off to make these drawers, but I will tell you, it was an EPIC FAILURE. Too heavy, too complicated. I finally bit the bullet and got two of these Rev-A-Shelf Double with the door mount kits. While not super seamless to install... it worked. And it's one of my favorite parts about the island.

Final Reveal...

So here it is... my island!! With a gorgeous slab of granite on top!

Balusters

Let's face it, moving in the middle of remodeling isn't ideal. There was so much hope that all things would be DONE before we moved in. They weren't. Like our front door.

Confession: I'm still painting the kitchen cabinets. Someone posted on our neighborhood Facebook page today that they went away on vacation for five days and came back to completely painted cabinets. I don't even know this person, but I don't like them.

So, I thought I'd try to start updating again in between painting and unloading boxes! Today, balusters!

When we started the floor project, we knew the question of stairs would have to be addressed at some point. The flooring company wanted roughly $2,500 to redo the banister, stairs, and balusters. The balusters alone were $20 each. We have 64...you do the math.

I couldn't do it. We were talking sanding and staining. It wasn't rocket science—just back-breaking sweat equity. Totally underestimated just how hard that was going to be. The sanding... ugh. Y'all know how much I hate sanding. 

But then came the balusters. And when I priced them at Lowe's (cheaper than my Home Depot stomping grounds!) I could get the plain ones for about $7 each and the decorative ones for $10 each including the feet and the 9.25% Tennessee tax (can you tell I'm slightly bitter?). My project was less than half the asking price! I did have to drive around to find enough for my project. I have mad respect for contractors and the work they do, but I read the tutorials and everything said this was going to be easy despite never attempting to do anything like this before. And it actually was! But it was also extremely time consuming...hence the price tag. It took me about three days, and those were actually days where someone else was watching the kids.

I started with the flat banister because that just seemed easier. It was. 

1. Remove the old banister and all the nails. Nails... ugh. They kept breaking off. 

2. Drill a hole a half inch deep with a 3/8 bit in the tread. Drill a 1 1/2" deep hole in the banister. Lucky for me... that was already done! The hole needed to be a little deeper on the tread. 

3. Measure from tread to banister. Add 1 1/4" to the measurement. 

4. Cut the baluster. Not my favorite part. I used my miter saw and just replaced the blade with a metal cutting blade. Of course it took me half an hour just to change the blade, but no worries... now I'm a pro! But metal on metal...sparks flying everywhere. Nope. Not my favorite. That was freaky. Wear your eye gear. We're not burning corneas on this one. Also, remember that it's HOT after you cut it, and you shouldn't touch freshly sawn metal. 

5. Tape the top (not the part you stick in the banister—just below that) so glue doesn't drop down. Okay, I did that part, but now that I'm through it... it was actually easier just to scrape off any dripping glue.

6. Put the foot on the rod the correct direction. Double check it's the correct direction multiple times. (One of these isn't correct!)

7. Put gobs of glue into the holes. I used liquid nails and gorilla glue. Neither really did what I wanted so at the end, I recalled a blog I read once and filled the gaps in the base with hot glue. Once I had everything installed, I did actually go back with a hot glue gun to help fill the holes and removed any wiggle room. Anything that dripped down, I just used a knife to shove it back in the hole. That way, it still helped keep the balusters from moving. Whatever works ya'll!

8. Shove baluster into the banister, and then into the base. 

9. At this point you can tighten the allen nut on the foot, but I'm painting the treads so I didn't. 

And that's basically how the flat part went! Yay! The angled banister got hard at step 1. This is when NONE of the nails wanted to come out. It got increasingly worse with the fact that there were no holes in the treads, and I had to drill them. Drill on top of the screws that weren't coming out. I broke two drill bits before I went and bought this Mack-daddy bit (on the left)...overall I broke five bits in this process. I also typically used a 12V drill because it's smaller. Definitely needed the 18V I keep in a box in the garage. What a difference between the two! Hole drilling definitely required the 18V just FYI. Also, you're probably supposed to wear shoes for this kind of thing. I clearly don't.

Yep...not hard, but definitely time consuming. Step. By. Step.
I'm still painting, but you can at least see what they look like installed!

I would definitely recommend this project as a good DIY. Hopefully you have less balusters.

The Art of Spackle

See the HUGE gap???

Crown molding gave me a rough couple of days. I looked up one day at my wonky crown molding with gaps galore and thought, "This is going to look so bad." I went home defeated and got on Pinterest. I'm not sure what I looked up exactly, but I found THIS and it has saved my sanity. I've hidden some pretty crazy things with spackle before (giant holes in my garage the day before we closed on our last house!!!) but this is genius. I wish I had taken a picture before I filled it with caulk. But I was desperately trying to figure out what I was going to do with it and all I had was caulk at the time!

I'll back up just a bit... things were going smoothly for me until I hit this long stretch of wall. I thought, "Oh, perfect! I'll hang an eight foot piece and be almost done!" Hung it. Went to hang the corner piece and it didn't fit. Cut a new piece. Didn't fit. I couldn't get the corners to connect. I measured it with my angle finder. 90 degree angle on the nose. Finally, I realized my eight foot piece wasn't sitting correctly on the wall so I took it down. I assumed it was a problem and cut it

There are three joints on that one stretch of wall!

down thinking I'd have more control in smaller pieces. Got to the end—corner piece does not fit. I ripped it all down three times before I decided the integrity of my plywood was in question and not intended to be pulled on repeatedly. On the forth attempt it didn't matter if it didn't fit—it was going to work. Period. I had no choice. So I hung this horrible match and went home. Best I can guess given that my angle is 90 degrees is that my ceiling is not. It happens. I wasted about $25 in crown molding too. It's getting used SOMEWHERE in this house. 

Back to the spackle... My container was a few months old and starting to dry out a little, which turned out to be good so I could roll it up like putty and fill my hole. I then let it dry for a few hours and tried to start sanding it and decided I ought to let it sit overnight. I was actually quite proud when I left after spackling day. 

Day three...Except for the excessive sanding, it wasn't so bad. It finally started to coming together. It doesn't look amazing here, but a little caulk and paint... a lot of caulk and paint... I started to feel less like I had bit off more than I could chew!

Did I mention the caulk? There's a lot.

I find a thick line followed by a wet paper towel seems to be the best application method. Did I mention that the entire house needs to re-caulked basically? It's going to be fun... Buuuutttt... now that it's painted. Look at the amazingness of this corner! It's a tad off, but it's also five feet up in the air.

 

The road to Pinterest fails is paved with good intentions...

Yep... I've disappeared for a while. Not because I'm not constantly working on the house. In all humility, I tell you it's because I've made a HUGE error in judgement that's cost me quite a bit of time and energy.

While I was sanding the stairs, covered in dust, I started thinking about the banister. I'm so over sanding. I'm using a gel stain on the banister, which actually doesn't require sanding. BUT after trying it on the stairs, I decided if I didn't want it quite so dark, I really needed to sand the banister. Or at the very least, I needed to get the polycoat removed. Enter the Pinterest idea. At some point, on some blog, on Pinterest somewhere... I read about someone using a gloss stripper to remove polycoat. And whoever it was raved about it. The catch is, I can't remember what they were using it for, and I have since decided it must have been for a flat surface like a cabinet door. 

So I got this stuff. In my mind, I thought I'd apply this stuff and then wipe it off and voila! I read the directions and it still didn't compute when it said to scrape it off. It didn't occur to me that this gel would dry. Hard. It would dry hard and require me to scrape every inch of banister. It would not wipe off. 

And here I am... three days later (in terms of working on the house at least) still scraping this stuff off the banister. And, you ask, "Did it work?" Kind of. Sort of. But not really. It's hard to tell as I have since taken the sander to it in desperation. 

Y'all. I'm sure this stuff is great for a flat surface. I can even tell you it will remove paint as it's removing paint from my balusters (totally fine--I have to repaint them anyway). But... ugh. Don't use it on your banister. You will be scraping for-EVER. Every nook and cranny. You can kind of see how it's removed some of the polycoat in the the picture. What gets me about this picture is that I'm actually planning on PAINTING this part of the stairs and probably could have just roughed it up really well with the sander and called it a day.

Luckily, I grabbed this little brush when I was in Home Depot last time. I think it was near the metal working tools, but I have no idea what it's really for. What I do know, is that it has saved my sanity today. It's really effective as scraping this stuff out of crevices. 

So, all that to say, I could have been done two days ago if I hadn't started down this rabbit hole. Don't do it. Don't. Just don't. 

 

Sneak Peek

 

On a fun note... our granite got delivered!! This is actually not what I originally had in mind. In fact, it's very much what I didn't want. But when we went to look at our options, all the ones I picked out were quartz or not the greatest grade of granite and therefore not as strong. My husband was pretty set against quartz, and there was no changing his mind.

Since I'm not a granite expert, time is against us, and I didn't have time to research, we went with the one my husband really liked. And honestly, I think it's absolutely gorgeous in my kitchen! It will also hide dirt better than what I would have picked. It's called Snow White. Not what I'd have named it, but no one asked me!

Stairs

Like all projects, our timeline has become "flexible." Our original six week goal has now been given an extra four week grace period. There are multiple factors in this decision:

1. When they ripped up the floor, it was discovered that the front door was rotting at the base and needed to be replaced. But finding the right guy for the job who doesn't want to charge an arm and a leg has been a little difficult.

2. We had leftover wood from our install downstairs and decided (after comparing costs) to install it upstairs instead of returning it (with a restocking fee).

3. Our tile for the shower still hasn't come in. The tile store blamed "the holidays," but the only holiday has been Easter! We're not sure about that one...

4. We decided to get the granite in the kitchen before painting the cabinets just in case we need to adjust the paint color selection. White cabinets. White granite. You see how this could go wrong.

I promise--the color is dead-on in person.

5. Installing the floor upstairs means we really need to refinish our own stairs instead of using the flooring company. We will no longer meet their minimum cost requirements if we don't have them refinish the floor upstairs, and we're not particularly interested in finding another contractor to fit in the mix. After testing six different stains and techniques I've finally found the right combo. But the SANDING!!

I managed to get out of the house sans kids today so I went to Home Depot and got the plywood for the upper cabinets I'm building in the bar area. I also picked up some electrical supplies to add an outlet under the counter. Dave looked at me the other day and said, "How are we going to plug in the wine cooler?" Well, good question! Guess we need to add an outlet! I got the wrong gauge wire... TIP: kitchens all use 20 amp circuits, which use 12 gauge wire--not 14 gauge. So, I'll do that tomorrow! I've got to get the bar area prepped so that it's read for the granite install on Monday!!! Not gonna lie--super excited about granite.

working my way up...

With the minor pause in my outlet install, which I will confess, took approximately five calls to my father, I decided I should tackle the nastiness of sanding the stairs instead. I'm going to hurt tomorrow. A belt sander, orbital sander, and mouse sander all to do the job. I was sooooo close to getting it done. But it just didn't happen before I had to get home to relieve the sitter.  And the poor contractor was trying to work around me while he dragged old flooring past me down the stairs.

Don't do this without a mask like I did. My sinuses are definitely irritated. I DID wear safety glasses though...just couldn't find the mask when I started.

This part RIGHT HERE will be white.

I'm hoping the rest will only take another hour or two and I can start working on the banister. I'm going to try a deglosser first and see if that gets me anywhere because this polycoat stuff is the biggest hurdle. I've decided to save myself some time and paint the landing for the balusters
(the part the balusters go into) white like the trim. We're planning to upgrade the balusters in the future and I feel like the white landing will just look better anyway. 

Sweat equity. 

Remember I'm still not done sanding the cabinet doors either. Ugh.

Valuable Lessons and Home Depot

I've been a little busy doing the same things again and again, and waiting for the contractors to do their part. I thought that might be a little boring to report. But I finally have an update! Before I get to that, I've learned some valuable lessons...

Repeated sanding day after day after day will eventually kill your Fitbit. Dead. 😭 and now I have no clue what time it is. 

DIY renovations will mean going to Home Depot exactly 8,763 times. Even on the days you are not going to Home Depot, you will go to Home Depot. Perhaps out of habit at this point, but you will go! You'll decide one day that plaster seems to fill out wood grain pretty well and end up with more. You'll need more caulk than anticipated (and still need more after that!) You'll accidentally cut the wrong piece of trim and now need another eight feet. But you'll buy sixteen feet, use it all, and still need more! And while you're there, you'll forget the light bulbs and need to go back ONE MORE TIME. 

Or perhaps because you will suddenly realize one day that you've done nothing to customize the lower cabinets and decide on a whim they need end caps. A whim. I'm either getting comfortable with my abilities here, or I'm spending too much time on Pinterest. But eventually you'll do this...

And then, as you're on your knees sanding the last little bit you'll realize the baseboards on the cabinets are not really baseboards at all. They are simply flimsy pieces of laminate that have no real aesthetic value at all and certainly not worth your time painting. So you'll need more trim. 

You'll buy a cabinet to add to the island... yeah, it's a little cheating and I WISH I had ample time to build the add-on myself, but I don't! Anyway... you'll buy a cabinet and then realize you bought one that houses a bathroom sink and has no top drawer. So you'll go back. 

You'll also need a new washer and dryer because you sold the last set since they were perpetually off balance, and quite frankly probably wouldn't have survived a move. And Home Depot will be having a SALE! 

The great part is that Home Depot just happens to be on the 5 mile route from the rental house to the new house. Thank goodness! 

It always amazes me when people offer to help me at Home Depot. It's absolutely NEVER an employee. Always someone who is cautiously offering because it's clear I know what I'm doing, but they're being nice because I have two kids in tow. I appreciate it, thank them, and then decline. I usually don't need help by this point! I could have used them while I was pushing a race car shopping cart and dragging a lumber cart behind me. 

Update!

I finished the crown molding, and I'm ready to paint the cabinet housing (not the doors yet). Worst case scenario at least I can put my dishes in the kitchen! I hope to paint this weekend once the dust settles a little.Once I do that, I'll have a full post on the ups and downs of crown molding.

They've installed enough of the floor (YAY FLOOR!) that I could start working on the island today. I was a bit intimidated by the island, but my plan to use a pre-fab cabinet is actually working really well. I'll take some more pictures and do a full post on the island when I finish assembling! 

The shower in the master bathroom is on it's way as well. The contractors are working on that part—as much as I would have liked to have tackled a shower...