Tiling

It was back to tiling on Sunday. I kinda surprised myself and didn't put it off another weekend, although I didn't get started until mid-day Sunday. I mixed half a bag of thinset and started where I left off last time. I'm probably about halfway done with setting the sheets. I still have the ceiling (that should be fun), the floor, and one more wall left before I can grout. We'll also need a handful of bullnose and trim tiles to go around the door and window. Above is a representation of a thinset zen garden.We splurged and are going to have two rainshower heads in this shower (his and her). Our days of showering in the upstairs tub are numbered!

One tiling job down, one more to go...

Scott and Steph, this is your shower. We are hoping to have it all finished by the time you guys come and camp out with us. Don't worry, those stud walls are going to get closed off and we might spring for a shower curtain.

House for Sale!

Just kidding, well maybe not really. We've been running around crazy lately with this red roof house, questioning why the hell we ever decided to build this ourselves. We certainly have our good days and our bad ones. We laugh now, but Todd threw his first hammer at the poor deck Monday night when he was nailing up siding. When one of us gets in a foul mood, the other one usually jumps on board to join in the fun. Funny how that works. As for the siding, last weekend the Woodmizer was back in action in a new shady location. We cut up a handful of oak logs with high hopes to use the boards for our siding but soon found out that most of the wood was no good. Over half of what we sawed up was rotten and was donated to the burn pile. Oh well, there are plenty of other dead oak trees on the property. Here's how things are shaping up so far with the siding. Just imagine the battens and a nice stain. We've got a ways to go but it's a start!

Here are also a few photos from our latest tiling project in the upstairs tub/shower. We are both taking the day off from work tomorrow to divide and conquer. We'll be busy tiling, hanging siding, taking delivery of the remainder of our kitchen appliances and probably running to Home Depot a few times. Seems like we're getting pulled in a million directions, but I guess that's to be expected when building a house.

Slate tile

We grouted our 16x16" slate tiles this week. The slate covers about 400 sq. ft. in our entryway, mudroom and guest bathroom. We decided to use "snow white" grout for a clean, modern look. We are happy with it and after grouting the cork, this was a piece of cake. So yes, we have finished flooring down and no drywall or insulation...seems a bit backwards but we'll get there.

Weekend work

We started the weekend by working in the master bath shower. We took down all the backer board, put up felt paper, reinstalled the backer board, then mixed up our final pitched mud layer for the floor. We were waiting for the "approved" plumbing inspection before we could cover the membrane layer. Now it's ready for tile.We headed out to lunch with Willy and Trish and then felt pretty motivated to finish installing our slate tile in the mudroom/guest bath.Precision cutting…After awhile the hammock started to look pretty appealing!

Cookie dough grout

We tackled our first grouting experience last week after work. Going around all those tiny mosaic cork pieces was very tedious but we're pleased with how it turned out. We'll let it sit for about a week and then apply a grout haze remover to get rid of the remaining film. Once it's finally sealed, the cork should really pop. Over the weekend Bradley and BT stopped by to check things out. Here's Bradley…

At it again…

On Sunday we continued installing the oak boards upstairs in one of the bedrooms. Here's an early morning shot of our master bedroom from upstairs.We started the day by sealing the cork tiles with 2 coats of clear satin polyurethane. This needs to be done before the tiles can be grouted. Here we are working upstairs. Some of the boards need to be wrestled into place, mostly the widest ones.Shawn and Fiona stopped by just after lunch for a visit. By the end of the weekend we accomplished installing 600 square feet of boards, 1400 to go!

Wood & Cork

On Saturday we started installing our oak flooring in the master bedroom. Logan came over to lend his expertise and Willy was also there to help. We got a pretty early start and began by cleaning the subfloor and rolling out the felt paper. The 15 lb. paper will act as a vapor barrier. Next, we snapped chalk lines to keep everything square. And here's the first board that was put down…The boards look better than we could have imagined. It's still amazing to think they came from monstrous white oaks on our property. We installed the boards random width and random length. The widest boards are 9 inches all the way down to 3. Jay gave us a guide to follow that went something like 73545678567459 and so on. The numbers were crossed off as the boards were laid across the room.Todd hammered the floor nailer while Logan and Willy worked to get the boards ready and cut to the right length. Here's Willy jigsawing away…And here's what happens when you don't wear gloves and swing a hammer around for about 2 hours…Ouch! It's not good when you get blisters over blisters.There, that's better. While the oak was going down in the master bedroom, Erin was laying the cork tiles in the master bathroom. The tiles went down pretty quickly with the wood adhesive. The little mosaic "pennies" tore off rather easily to work around corners, the tub and our future toilet. The hard, pain in the butt part will probably be the grouting.Here are several more shots of the bedroom progress…Later in the day, when the bedroom was complete, Kelly and River stopped in to check things out. River gave his approval and played with Mimi.