Bathroom Tile and Bedroom Fun

Well, yesterday, I bought tile (which I've yet to photograph to put in this blog!). Ended up going with a type of porcelain tile that has the look of marble (rather than actually going with marble). The colors in it is in the neutral range, with greys, browns, beiges, etc. I really need to get some pics of it! The grout I chose to go with it is a shade called bone, but is kind of a dark beige, which picks up some of the colors in the tile. Unfortunately, the guy that was supposed to lay my tile for me won't be able to until the end of next week (which is far, far too late!), so my friend and I are going to give it shot on Sunday ourselves. He's at least laid tile before, so he has a good idea of what we need to do. Most likely, he and I will lay the tile Sunday, then I'll grout Monday.

Today, I spent most of the morning caulking my bedroom walls. There were a lot of places where the paneling didn't quite meet correctly, or where holes needed filling, and such. I've never really caulked before, but I got the hang of it pretty quickly. It's actually kind of soothing and relaxing to caulk. Makes you feel good filling in holes and dips and smoothing them out so that when you paint, you don't see all of that. Or hopefully you don't, anyway! I made sure to choose a caulk that was latex, with silicone additives, that is paintable, and that dries relatively fast (40 minutes). I'd no idea just how many types of caulk there are! If nothing else, this renovation has been an education in and of itself!

After caulking in the morning, I went by Home Depot to get more caulk (I'd only bought one tube last night and had run out), and discovered a khaki shade of paint by Behr called Peanut Butter. I checked out the chip card, then decided I'd get a sample and try it. There was a slight mixup with the guy filling in at the paint desk; I told him "sample" and he heard "gallon". So when he labeled and handed me the gallon, I commented that was an awfully big sample. When he realized what I wanted, he mixed up a sample real quick and I took it out to the house and tried it.

The Peanut Butter trim looks LOTS better than the Tomato Bisque (even though I still like the Bisque hehe). So, I decided that's what I'm going to go with. I found myself at Home Depot tonight to get an extension pole for my paint roller, and discovered the gallon of Peanut Butter on the "Oops" table for $5, so I went ahead and grabbed it. I think I may even paint my ceiling fan blades that color.

Once I tried out the Peanut Butter, I then went about getting the ceiling ready to apply the Killz to it so I could paint the acoustic tiles. I figured I'd leave them in place, for insulation, and just paint over them. However, first I had to fix a "sag" in one section of the ceiling. I had bought some long roofing nails just for this purpose; other nails I had tried tore right through the tiles and didn't correct the sag at all, but these nails were just the ticket. Long enough to grip the clapboards that make up the ceiling under the tiles, and with a wide enough head to hold, without puncturing, the tiles, they did the trick. Once that was done, I then swept off the tiles and tried removing the AC vent from the ceiling. However, when the bathroom was built (or perhaps rebuilt), they placed one of the walls directly under part of the vent - so the vent is wedged in place by 2x4's. So, I couldn't remove that. Then, there were 3 water stains in the tiles. I had to apply the Killz 4 times to hide those stains, but at least when I paint over the Killz, the stains won't show through. I didn't finish Killzing the ceiling, though, since it was starting to get late and I needed an extension pole for the roller.

All in all, a productive day. Tomorrow I plan to finish Killzing the ceiling, then paint it once it dries, and then paint the walls and trim. Hopefully it'll all come together!