Saturday, February 2, 2008

Grouting the tile...and my fingernails, and cuticles, and knuckles...

I like Saturday mornings on HGTV. It's one of the few times during the week when they have shows that are at least remotely dedicated to DIY issues more laborious than correcting bad taste or selling homes.

This morning, one show featured a couple who'd had a tiling disaster; more specifically, they'd had a grouting disaster. Great, I thought. I'm grouting the kitchen tile today-- this way, I'll know what not to do.

Oh, I found out what not to do-- and in the process scared myself so shitless of the whole project that I ended up cleaning the haze too quickly and having to regrout the left half of the counters.Also, I went with charcoal grout rather than the midnight black we originally bought. The black grout was the same brand as the first troublesome batch of thinset we used on the backerboard. Since I had no idea whatsoever how to do this or what the stuff was supposed to look or feel like, I decided that the little picture-directions weren't going to cut it for me. I need words. Adam is sick this weekend (please don't have type 1 flu, please don't have type 1 flu, please don't have type 1 flu). So I had to make the executive decision of going with "charcoal" colored grout from Home depot. With directions that use the alphabet. I hope it's not too light.

Otherwise, all went well, I think.
(It's not as light gray as it appears with the camera flash) I also got some touch up painting done. Yay for me. More to do tomorrow.

4 comments:

April said...

Looks like you did a good job! Keep up the good work. One of the best parts is to look at photos of what "it used to look like" and compare it to what you're doing now. That always helped me to remember that it was worth it. :)

Sandy said...

Nice job! I love that tile.

Jennifer said...

It looks good! We went with a color of grout about that color for our bathroom floor.. it's nice because it doesn't show dirt very well!

Fred said...

Looks great - - I love the tile choice, too.

Fred
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