I like to start the summer with a Post-It
listing the projects I'd like to get done before school starts.
Kitchen!
I wrote optimistically.
I planned to take up the gross old tile,
put down new laminate tile,
paint the walls,
and install a pantry.
It was going to be great!!
But then...
summer ran down, and I looked hard at the kitchen.
Oy.
It was going to be a lot of work.
So I re-calibrated, and decided to...
That seemed doable.
It's hard to photograph the grossness of the entryway (and kitchen) tile.
It's porous, so it's literally never clean, no matter how much I scrub it.
And... let's be honest. I don't scrub it often.
Why bother, when it won't look much different, anyway?
Soooooo...
Day One!
I swung my sledgehammer,
deployed my tile scraper,
and after a few hours it was all up.
Y'know the weird thing?
As per the internet's advice,
I covered the tile with an old towel while I whacked away at it.
The tile cut holes in the towel...
and the holes were actually burnt at the edges!
The friction or something melted my towel!
Yikes!!
I pushed the tiles into piles, loaded them up in buckets and boxes,
and drug them out to the trash.
It was time for a break, so I took my grubby, sweaty self to the Bamboo Cafe
for a take-out boba tea and Vietnamese egg sandwich...
I was a tad tired when I was done.
And holy moly, was I freaking DIRTY!
My poor beauty school pedicure! It shone so bravely through the grime!
(Sidenote: if you're getting a pedicure and want your legs
to be silky-smooth for the beautician?
Don't forget your feet.
It looked like I was resting hobbit feet in Carol's lap.)
After I scrapped myself from the floor
I literally had to scrub my arms, legs and feet with a fingernail brush
to get all the sticky grime off.
.
.
.
Day Two!
From past experience, I know that days two and three can be the hardest part.
(I rarely do a job that takes longer than three days.
It's just too stressful for the Sweet Man.)
The bulk of the job is often done,
but I need the extra oomph to put my sweaty work clothes back on,
get the tools out again,
and power on through and finish up.
And this time, I also had to deal with
THIS.
"What's the problem?" you ask.
"It's just a box of leftover tile, right?"
Yes, to you or me, it looks like a box of tile.
But to my kitty Jack?
Well, let's just say Jackie has
a drunken frat boy's casual definition of what constitutes a "toilet."
Wooooo!!!! No Porta-Potty? No problem!!!
Jack is the coolest cat I've ever owned (in a long line of cool cats);
he is in fact the Springsteen of kitties, BUT if it's a box?
He considers it a litter box.
So before I could grout, I grumpily had to take all the tiles out of the box
and clean them off with Lysol scrubby-wipes.
(I should buy stock in these dang things, I go through so many in my pet-filled household.)
But I can't stay mad at him, that sweet Jackie-cat.
He really is a love.
and while the grout was drying, I tackled another job:
repainting the floorboards and walls near the floor.
Lady MacGyver tip!
I didn't want to use the big paint tray for such a little job,
so I just lined a small cardboard box with tinfoil.
After painting, I sealed the grout,
reattached the floorboards,
and picked up all the tools and trash that are the byproduct of a renovation.
My secret weapon to staying on task for this last slog?
An audiobook!
Listening to Ann Patchett's steady voice as she recounted her friendship
with sister writer Lucy Grealy tethered and focused me,
so I was less likely to noodle on the computer work on another project.
By the time the Sweet Man and the Boy came home,
the floor was ready to walk on and dinner preparations were in progress.
Not so bad, right?
But let me tell you: renovations are like childbirth.
It's easy to forget the sweating and screaming and only remember the results.
Awww, isn't a pwecious widdle entryway?
And they always, ALWAYS take longer than expected.
I can GUARANTEE that a floorboard will shatter,
paint will run out,
or tiles will be just half an inch too big on one side,
requiring laborious chipping of a dozen tiles to shave down to the right size.
But!
Without my sweat equity and envelope of Etsy cash,
we'd still be living with smudged flat-white walls,
eau de pet dingy carpeting,
and tile that is grosser than a bus station's bathroom.
So I say...
