Remodel Days 38 + 39
Day 38
With the world of tile swirling about me, I finally meet the tile man—Vladimir. We do show and tell on the backsplash and it is apparent to me that I have taken a bigger bite than I could have ever imagined. Oh well. Sunday should be rainy and I should spend the day in my basement laying out the ultimate backsplash design, making sure I have enough stuff and figuring out how to transmit this design to Vlad. I imagine it will be by fervent photos and little baggies of accent tiles. I think, that to randomize the design and to account for the additional 7 feet or so of backsplash I didn’t anticipate, I will need to add more of the weird and wacky stuff. That’s readily available so not a catastrophe.
Meanwhile I did sort of learn my lesson and will do the field tile in the shower in a very commercially available and easy-to-work-with white subway tile. The General feels confident now that the impaired joist will be able to stand up to the weight of a mudset shower pan. This will send me back to P&L today with a rough shower measurement and an eye for putting together a nice trim piece and perhaps floor, although again, that’s going to go much more quickly if I just get some conventional commercial netted small tiles.
Day 39
I’m back at the Pratt & Larsen outlet room and I grab a stack of large decorative tiles that all sort of go together. They are pretty much six inch square tiles with light greens, barely pinks and interesting textures. I can’t say why but they appeal to me and I can picture them ringing the shower about a third of the way down. (they do satisfy the calming advice.) My first go round I have them on end but it’s going to be too tricky to find something to fill in the triangles that leaves behind. I think they might be nice separated by strips of glass one x one tiles that are so popular and, OMG, this might be the place to introduce the whatever-it-is with a little pink. Then I can take a barely rose color to the bedroom walls, fantasize more about my insane vine idea and be done with it (no! I can really have some fun with the cabinet in the bathroom. At least I can go Hot Knobs. Simple, sweet, decorative, not overwhelming. Restrained, by gum, and easy on the tileman. This will make up for the kitchen backsplash.)
I run over to Truax—the place for doors. This suddenly seems like an emergency because Lowe’s says the door I like is a three week order. Well I don’t really need such a fancy door. I just haven’t been able to get the name of place to go door shopping until now. I go, I’m helped by a nice guy who seems to know what he’s talking about and I find a simple door that will let in lots of light. The guys next door sell a security film and I’ll have that installed on the window. Easy peasy lemon squeezy. Why the emergency? I could have done this months ago.