Home improvement
Late last year we got a load of tile from a friend that they couldn’t use. It’s been sitting in the garage since then. This weekend we finally got time to get around to re-tiling our entryway. The original linoleum tile was not the most lovely but it wasn’t ancient when we moved in so we left it where it was.
Friday night I got home from work and started ripping out the old stuff. There were two layers of the stuff there and we attacked it with small chisels and a giant tile scraper. Pulling up the 25 year old bottom layer took nearly 3 hours.
Saturday morning we woke up bright and early to start laying the new tile. We decided to run to Lowe’s to grab some accent tiles to compliment the new tile. We figured without the accents the floor would be rather boring. After planning out what the pattern would look like I realized my little hand operated tile cutter wasn’t going to be up to the task. The pattern called for every single tile to be cut in some way. We rented a large wet saw to do all the cutting. Without it we’d have never gotten things done.
We had a good system going. I’d cut the tile, my wife would lay the mortar, and my son would lay and space the tile. Laying all the tile took us about 3-4 hours. After using the tile saw all day I decided I’ve got to get myself one of those.
This morning we woke up and got around to doing the grout. This only took us about another hour. After all the cleaning and such was done we ended up with what we thought was a pretty damn good job. I’ve done tile work before and actually enjoy doing it. I guess if things don’t work out in the IT career path then I’ve got a backup.