Project 2016 -- Florida or Bust:Kitchen Makeover -- With a Little Help From My Family!

My brother-in-law is the greatest!

As some of you who follow my blog know, I am in the home stretch with my kitchen make over. Counter tops -- check! Cabinets painted -- check! Walls painted -- check! Down to the back splash for this weekend's project and I got a call from my sister who said she and her husband wanted to come over and see for herself what I had done so far. I jokingly said that I would welcome their visit as I could use my BIL's help with the recycled tile backsplash.

Right on schedule, my Sis and BIL showed up. He brought an old shirt with him to work in and as I set the big mesh pieces of tile, he started to cut the little pieces to fill in around the outlets. He turned an ALL DAY job into just a few hours. After almost 40 years as my BIL, he's turning out pretty useful!

I have to say that one of the best purchases I ever made was a small wet saw. I have done several small tile jobs (and the next job on my list is the guest bathroom tile around the tub) and a wet saw makes a HUGE difference on how fast you can get the job done. Renting one is possible, but when I bought it, the saw was on sale for under $150 and it would have cost me $75 to rent one for a day. Now 10 years later, 2 houses, and a few tile jobs later, buying it was a great decision.

One of the things that I wanted was to make sure that all of the outlets were brought out to the level of the tile and had plenty of support behind it. Cutting all the little pieces was tedious work, but will make all the difference in the long run.

Tomorrow, I will grout the tile and that will be it until the next project! I am so glad it is almost over. Now to plan a little get together for my friends and neighbors to break in this new kitchen. What's a new kitchen if you can't share and enjoy it!

Happy Grouting!