Happy Friday Guys! I am hyped that it is the weekend, but at the same time… I am sad that it is Friday of Spring Break 🙁 I am not ready for the kids to head back to school, I always need a little more time. One because they make me laugh and it is always an adventure with a toddler and teenagers around the house. And two because they have helped with the chores and with their little brother so much! I love watching them with our little guy. Saying it is really cool is an understatement for sure! But I guess it is the law that they have to go to school, and until I win the lotto, I have to work, which means no homeschooling just yet!
If you saw my insta yesterday, you saw that we had some leftover subway tile from a job and I asked my husband if it would work (and most importantly be enough) for our backsplash.
It had this white formica (plastic..yyy, composite) sheeting on the wall since we moved in. We first had plans to put an addition on the house and this wall would have come down in the process to open the dining room up to the kitchen. And I was actually thinking about switching the dining and kitchen, if the addition happened. Than we decided to buy our biggest baby, a (now) 16 year old Quarter Horse… So we no longer want an addition and stay in the village, we would like more space in the country to bring our baby home and add to our family with a few other animals 🙂 So honestly, I didn’t really think about re-doing this backsplash until recently. I pulled that formica up on the edge just to a take a little peek behind it, and that darn laminate snapped a chunk off!!!
Really a blessing in disguise!!
I took some measurements, got those subway tiles out of the box and laid them out on the floor to see if I had enough. It was close, but I thought it could work. I ask my husband if I gathered the rest of the materials if he would do it. I got the YES! So I made a little area in my room and had everything organized and ready to go. I was thinking the next rain day (which forces no outside work) I would have a beautiful new subway tile backsplash, in a classic white color, to make me HAPPY!!!
Well,
I waited,
and waited,
and waited….
And than I watched a few youtube videos and BAM, my helper and I tackled the tile ourselves. My first tile project of any sort.
(excuse the lack of professional photos, safety was our number one priority, and well… making sure we didn’t mess up and come up short of tile hahah!)
The whole process was pretty easy, we applied the thin set, using a toothed trowel, and then placed the tile on… I should have used the spacers, but I didn’t know we had them in the basement (with all the tile tools) until AFTER I had finished, haha! The hardest part of the whole thing was:
The tiles on the wall are level, but comes to find out our cabinets and countertop are just a little (or a lot) out of whack! That happens with an older home, nothing is square. I will continue to embrace it, and think of it as character 🙂
If I started in the center, like a real professional (like my brother, father in law, and brother in law) would have done, my end cuts would have been the same size. BUT, guys I didn’t want to run out of tile!! So not professional at all, but boy did Lucca and I make some memories!
❤❤❤
I will take the cuteness over perfection any day. However, that being said, when we build our next home, I will call in the professionals, haha!
We continued until all the tile was laid (is that what you do, lay tile 🤔?) Anyway, than I realized that our wet saw wasn’t home.
So we measured each piece and labeled the tiles (by numbering the backs) and had them all set for when the wet saw would arrive home from a job…or my brother in law…or I would borrow my Dad’s! But life happens and I had to work for the following five days, so it sat all pretty without the cut pieces in, nor the grout, for at least a week!
One day I came home from work to find all the tiles cut perfectly, and re-labeled all ready for me! SO EXCITING!! A few days later, I had them bad boys up on the wall, and the installing portion of this project was complete! I have to say, I was impressed, with the un-even house, my little helper, and schlepping my older ones around in the middle of doing the tile, I think it came out alright!
My hubby took it across the finish line the other night! He added water to the grout and mixed it up, and just applied it in the joints with a grouting trowel. You just keep going over and over until the joints are filled.
He let it set for a little bit, maybe 15-20 minutes until the grout
looked like it was drying, like this:
Once it was looking more grainy and sandy, he started sponging off the access.
And the finished DIY subway tile backsplash 🙂
Perfect, NO. Perfect to me, YES! As I have mentioned on here in previous posts, we plan on re-surfacing the countertops with concrete. Now that should be my husband’s speciality since he poured foundations FOREVER!!! But I won’t be afraid to start that project without him either, hahaha!
Doing home improvement while you are living and breathing in the space, isn’t always easy. It doesn’t always go as planned, but that shouldn’t stop you from doing them. I was lucky to have the tile on hand, not being used. But check out your local Habitat for Humanities Re-store. Local contractors often donate their left overs there. Craigslist is another source for cheaper material. “Design on a dime” can really happen!
Since we are planning to move, and rent this out, we aren’t putting a ton of money into our little fixer upper, but that doesn’t mean we don’t continue to improve our home. After all, it has been in our family for 120 years… IT DESERVES THE LOVE!
Thank you for reading and following along! Please leave your thoughts in the comments. Ask any questions, and I will do my best to answer them. If I don’t know, I will go to the tile experts in my family and ask them for y’all!
Hope you guys have a great weekend! And on a quick side note, thanks for the kind words on this new blogging adventure, it means so much to me!!
XOXO
Leandra