well grout me and call me good

We got our tiles and grout up the other day.  It really made a HUGE difference for the kitchen.  We were so use to painted wallpaper (yes, that is what the contractor did) that now we feel like kings our kitchen.  We can actually clean our backsplash now.  Tiling is really not that difficult.  We started at 9am and finished around 10pm that night.  Applying grout was really easy.  We bought two colors and did a test strip.  I highly recommend this as well, if you can't decide on the color.   We attached our tiles with Liquid Nails to a piece of drywall and grouted them.  We didn't need to view our tiles for 24 hours to decide the color.  We instantly knew what we liked.  Whew!

Here's a picture of the tiles going up.  We chose the gray grout, which is actually lighter in color than above due to the grout still being wet in that photo.

What really helped was using tiling mats.  Oh my goodness!  If you are going to tile anything, buy tile mats!!!  You simply stick the mat to the wall and place your tiles on top.  Super easy.  

There's still much to do for the kitchen.  I need to work on our island, frame the dishwasher, install a new kitchen light, and finish painting a few spots.   As for the island, I wanted to refinish the one we have.  It turned into a big FAT fail.  I must show you pictures!  I just don't have any at the moment.  So I have been playing with the idea of buying a used a dresser and turning it into an island.  It's not a new concept, but I really like it.  I found a few pictures to help you get the idea.  Mine, of course, would be a glossy white.  As for the top, there are several options that I can do, but no matter what, I will be placing something on top.

Apartment Therapy

Remodelholic

Beautiful Nest

 

 

the kitchn

Okay, are you getting the idea? :)  I have to say that our kitchen redo, overall, is not that bad.  It's only been a few months because we are sooo slow.  And we didn't do any major demolition like knock out a wall.  We ain't going Young House Love style here.  That family is going all out, and I LOVE what they are doing.  It is so nice to have a pretty kitchen again.  Do I need to bring out the hot mess again? Okay, since you asked.

 I need to explain something here.  When we first moved in all the cabinets were white, but the contractor did such a crappy job.  I'm talking no sanding, no priming, and HUGE paint drips.  But when you're buying your first home, your so giddy you don't pay attention to stuff like that.  All you think is, "Hey this is waaaay better than my last kitchen."  Now why are there brown spots on the cabinets?  Well, a year ago I attempted to scrap off the paint so we could save money by not buying new cabinets.  But because the cabinets were in such poor shape and the paint was so crummy, I could barely get it off.  Even paint remover wasn't working very well.  So I gave up.  So we lived with white and brown cabinets for about a year before we got new ones.   The wait was definitely worth it!