Still in shock over Prince rip

http://youtu.be/6SFNW5F8K9Y

#nationalpetday

And let's not forget the hens 

Dogroom remodel.

Ever since day one I'm living in my house my dogs have always had their own bedroom that they share as the dog room. Since it's traditionally a bedroom it had carpet in there. After living here couple years it was definitely time for that carpet to go especially after Benji potty training in my house. He really has been good about that except for that room and it wasn't accident peeing it was more of him marking. The new set up is essentially the same as the old. Just with 12"x24" porcelain tile. (See previous post) One thing I have realized though this last week is that Benji has no problem being in a plastic crate even, if it's just big enough for him. And he seems to be calmer in it than the wire one. I went to tractor supply and got the a new one that was the next size up, which is the middle crate (size large 36" crate). I also got new beds for all the dogs since they were on sale. I did shift the crates closer to the wall to so I didn't need the dividers between each crate since they had more space. And generally sydalee doesn't get locked up during the day lately so I turned her crate to the side and open the side door. Before I've always it tied the shut because she such a jailbreaker but she does do better out of her crate with her separation anxiety. And said she'll probably be walking in and out of the room so she'll have access to the hallway I figured I'd put Benji back in the middle. He was in the middle once before and it didn't go so well but maybe that was partly because of the wire crate? it's always easy enough to shift the crates around if need be.... But I'm sure the change will have them playing musical crates for a couple days trying to figure out where they belong Lucy should be OK since she's in the same spot. 

Here is the before to refresh your memory 

So glad to have the carpet out of this room! 

Grout color.

One major thing I've learned this week with my home's renovation is that grout color is not always as it appears. 

My contractor knew I wanted the dog room and kitchen room to be a gray grout and he went to Home Depot and purchased two different grays that he thought would work great with the two tiles I picked out. 

The kitchen was Delorean Gray and looks awesome! It dries is a very light gray and works great with the lights tones of the tile.  However for the dogs room he went with what was called an oyster gray grout. We did show it to me and I approved it looked gray on the bag: 

With this color looks are deceiving to say the least. When it went on it was looking awesome: 

As it dried it turned to a white.  Even my contractor didn't understand it. Really change my opinion of the room and not in a good way: 

I definitely wanted to grout to blend with the tile and not stand out.  As it was drying and I saw it turn whiter and whiter. I went to Home Depot's app on my phone and pulled up the oyster gray color to see what it looks like online and it definitely looks different online than it does even on the bag.

Since I was really not feeling the color

I turned back to Pinterest for solutions. Saw many pins about using grout colorant to renew or change grout color. My contractor said the gray was more of a green gray so I decided to go with what looks to be a green gray called natural gray colorant. And now I know to go by the online colors for a more realistic scheme after drying instead of looking at the bag color.  (I assume the grout color would be similar but I'm only using it in the colorant so couldn't vouch for that.)

I did this right away, not want to live with the way it was looking. Also being a new floor I wanted to be able to show it off and I do not want to show the white lines. It was easy enough to apply. I did buy a fine brush at Home Depot but I ended up not even really using it. A toothbrush was the better option. I would basically just do a line at a time and put the colorant down and then quickly wiped away the excess on the tile and worked my way out of the room. One bottle was plenty for the whole room which is 100 sqft. So it was like a $15 fix and makes a world of difference. 

Now I love this room so much I'm not even sure I want to give it back to the dogs as a dog room. 

Day 6, final day!

Day 5 of floor project.

I'm sure branch home improvement's is glad they got the kitchen tile all down today.  I was even able to lay the last piece 😀.  Now it just has to be grouted tomorrow and finishing touches. I love the tile and everything overall. 

Working his way out of the room

I love the contrast to with the backsplash and tile

And the dog room is now grouted and just needs finishing touches. 

Side note :Too bad I've already dropped an egg on my not even finished floor.  Luckily it hit the tile square so it just broke on the surface of the tile & fairly easy cleanup. Just goes to show how much wear I put my house through #chickenkeeperproblems

Floor project Day 4

For day four of this project I'm sure my contractor regrets giving me an extra day to think about the floor pattern in the kitchen. 
Once I realize what I thought I wanted to do with the tile was not possible in the vertical line offset by a third pattern & it made it look too striping, I started to really doubt if I even want to lay this tile. And after looking I could do another option that was in stock that I could do an exchange of tile.... I was thinking that might be my Plan B & can get done in the same timeframe but it was a lot lighter and let's face it, a white floor with three dogs is not a good idea.... So I decided to go to Pinterest and search the tile name specifically, which is "Marazzi Grigio". In the search I found somebody who did the foryer in the herringbone pattern using the smaller 6x24" tile. 

So first thing this morning I sprung doing this pattern on Mr. Branch, my contractor.  He even humoring me by laying out the pattern roughly in the space so I can see exactly what it would look like. Maybe he was hoping I would think it would look busy but I fell in love with that right away.

 It's definitely more complicated and harder to do & has the project in overtime. But due to the difficulty I understood when he asked for a little bit more money. I was making this more complicated than what I initially planned. But It really makes a world of difference in the tile. And after Mr. Branch laid it out for me, I pulled out a couple tiles to line it vertically. Even though I did only one row and not the full offset pattern, it was easy to see what a night/day difference the pattern makes in the tile appeal. 

Really takes it to ugly to lovely. My contractor agreed.  So he went to work on the herringbone pattern; and stayed late & this was the outcome of day 4.  I had asked them to center it with the bay window, since to me that's the focal point of the room

.

Branch Home Improvements also completed the dog room so it's ready for grout

and they grouted in the backsplash.

 It all looks awesome. Their quality of work has been beyond superior. 

Day three of floor project

Slow progress today....kitchen was completed with the backer board placement. And dog room tile is almost all set. 

I spent half the morning trying to lay a pattern for the kitchen floor only to realize that going completely random is best

.  I just need the floor tile in the kitchen to go down so I can stop second guessing it. I'm gonna consider it being like the roof how I second-guessed not up until it was completed and once it was done I loved it so hopefully the kitchen will end up the same because right now I can go back-and-forth with liking it or not. If they had a another tile that was in stock, that I like better, I'd probably have already swapped it out but it is the best stock option & at this point I don't want to delay this project. Already gonna take a day longer then I thought. Most of that is Home Depot's fault though because they've kind of given my contractor the runaround and even ended up having them deliver some tile out to my house since my contractor had already gone there twice to pick it up when they said they would have it. Also while we are waiting for that delivery notice that one of the dog room boxes was given to us in the wrong color of the tile and it was the first box so luckily I caught my contractor cutting the first piece. Bennett branch with Branch Home Improvement called Home Depot & the manager on the phone said they would bring out the box and exchange it when they brought out the other tile but that didn't happen. I went to Home Depot to exchange it. It was easy enough  but Home Depot has definitely added hassle into this project. 

Another storm another tree down

Luckily these trees are falling due to all the storms have not been really property damaging and if they are it's nothing too severe that I can't handle, thank god! 

Day 2 of the floor project

The before picture above.

It was a floating vinyl plank floor. After ripping that up my contractor thought he reached original floor.

But wrong. Apparently every owner of this house has redone the kitchen floor but up until now they've just done one on top of each other. 2 layers of rolling sheet vinyl floors under the floating planks, 3 total floors. 

High gloss vinyl at its finest 😉

After ripping up all the layers of flooring and putting the new concrete backers down, by the end of day two this was the kitchen status...branch home improvement sure has been working hard. 

Home project under way.

The before kitchen (above) 

The before dog room. A room that is designated for three dogs has no business with carpet in it. I didn't realize I had black mold growing until I pulled up a rug in the location of it makes me think it was due to a water bowl leaks. 

Luckily the subfloor was in good condition. And put kilz down so my male pup can't smell any previous marks. 

After day one of work done by Branch home improvement. Also they got a lot of the back splash done. 

Not even done yet and I'm loving