Ten on Ten - March 2012

This weekend, Heather, Emily and Anna came for a visit. It was such a great weekend - even though our original plan of heading to visit the zoo was foiled by cold rainy weather. We just played and played all weekend long.

early morning movie/play time with Emily & Anna - letting Mommy sleep in a bit more

Emily's "suicide" bowl of cereal -- fruit loops, rice krispies and chocolate mini wheats

puzzle time

Emily and Mommy riding the escalators at North Park

fun sculpture at North Park

visiting the ducks and turtles!

yummy lunch!

sweet sisters!

sorting scrabble letters!

Movie time! Anna is loving her popcorn!

Thanks for coming girls!! It was lots of fun!!!

See other Ten on Ten participants here

Kitchen Backsplash Project

When I bought my house, one of the things that sold me on it was the kitchen.  Beautiful black granite countertops, high end stainless appliances and great cabinet space.  However, the backsplash was always just .... meh.  Not awful, but not great. And the one thing that made it even worse, the prior owners grouted in the switchplates when they installed the backsplash. Not the right way to do it, but not enough reason to rip out the tile.....UNTIL one of the switchplates fell off and I had no way to put it back up.  

before.....basic 4x4 tile.

before

the infamous grouted switchplate

and the one that fell off....which started the whole project

I finally decided it was time to remedy the situation and contacted my friend David who has done quite a bit of other work for me in the past.  He was pretty busy, but willing to squeeze me in on weekends and evenings if I was willing to be his helper.  So, I took him up on the opportunity to learn a bit about tiling and to save myself a little money.


Spent hours and hours online looking at photos of kitchens and finally settled on mini subway tile. (did you know Home Depot will check out a tile board and let you bring it home to see the tile at home?) 

So, one Saturday a few weeks ago, David came over bright and early and we got down to the business of demolition.

Ended up having to take it down to the studs.....the tile just didn't want to let go of the existing sheetrock.  While the studs were open, I took the opportunity to write scripture in the walls as I also did when we remodeled the master bathroom.

After a full day of demolition, we ended with fresh sheetrock and plans to tile later in the week.

Over the next two weeks, one night at a time, we tiled one wall, then the other, then grouted. Here are a few shots of our progress.....

first tiles going up!

sink wall completed - waiting on grout

stove wall completed - waiting on grout

stove wall grouted!

sink wall grouted!

And finally, new outlets, switches and switchplates installed and everything put back on the counters!

the finished product!

the finished product!

So happy to have it all done!  Living in chaos for 3+ weeks was about to drive me nuts. But it was definitely worth it.