Another project!

OH NO, not another project! My Husband and I have had many projects since we returned from Germany to our house we had rented out for several years. About 8 years ago, Papa Porcupine purchased the maple hardwood from a old school gym floor. It was much work with planing the wood and preparing it,laying it and finishing it, but finally about 5 years ago he put a very nice maple floor in our family room (which originally started out as our attached garage). Another big project was our first attempt to tile. This was in our kitchen about 2 years ago. It was a learning experience and we are still very much enjoying the tile.

We also refinished a section of nice hard wood in our kitchen and also the hall way. This hard wood had been covered and hid for many years.

It turned out real nice but again was very much work with a rented floor sander.

Our big project last summer was building a two car garage. We attached it to a workshop that was already there. It also was a lot of work. We did have some help a couple days to help with the really big high hard stuff. Last summer was also very hot so most of our work was done in early morning and late afternoon or evening. I took a lot of fun pictures as the garage went up and through the finishing touches.

You can see how important our fishing boat is,

we built the garage right around the boat. It also doubled as a ladder or step stool.

Below , 2007 project!

On Wednesday last week, we went to Sears so I could order new glasses, we had been talking about a new washer and dryer for quite some time to replace our 30+ year old washer and dryer. Well, little did we know, that was the day. We found what we wanted at a great sale price. This meant no more procrastination with our utility room. You see, we had purchased extra floor tile 2 years ago when we did our kitchen but had been putting it off. We also had to take out shelves, paint and move some electrical wiring and outlets. Thankfully, Papa Porcupine knows how to do all that stuff and Thursday we got going with it. You can see the old vinyl tile squares and under linoleum being chipped of the floor. Friday I soaked the floor to get all that black stuff (mainly old smelly glue) of the floor. Sunday late afternoon (church in the morning) we did some painting.

Monday was a hard long day for me as I am the one who lays the tile. My husband had the heavy work though, carrying in those boxes of 15 ceramic tile. I could never have done that. It would have taken me at least 3 trips per box. He also got the wet saw out and set up for me outside. Then he had to go to our local hardware store for more spacers, more tile and then more adhesive. It's hard to get things estimated just right and we were working with what we had left from the kitchen 2 years ago.

After the floor was all clean and level, I lay out the tiles to make sure they are spaced right and find out where I need to cut tiles to fit corners and edges. The blue spacers are a must and really help to keep the tiles straight and even.

Almost done laying them out. only a few more close to our family room door to cut and place.

If you look in our family room, you can see just a part of that maple hard wood gym floor.

Now you know why we did the cutting outside, Yes, even though it was 100 degrees, IT IS ONE MESSY JOB. You can see the water spraying up to keep the blade wet and cool as it slowly cuts through the ceramic tile. I was a mess but I must admit the water spraying up on me did keep me cool also.

Here you can see how the tile is the same as our kitchen tile. It was purchased at the same time. Except we ran out of tile and had to call the store, make sure they still had the same exact tile and get 1 more box of 15. The utility room took 44 tiles. That's a lot of bending and lifting. I would stack up 2 rows at a time, spread the adhesive and then put down the tile and space it using many of the blue spacers.

DONE, AT LAST!
I finished at 9 pm. I had worked 13 hours on this floor but once I was started, dirty and had the mess, I thought it would be best to just keep going until I was finished gluing them down. Now they have to set from 24 to 48 hours before I can grout. That's another big messy job. I can tell why tile is such a expensive popular floor. It takes so much work and time. We will have a couple more weeks before our new washer and dryer come. They are front loading and will be stacked. I hope if you ever try the tiling thing, that you have as much fun as I did. I'm sure we will enjoy the tile for years to come.