Another tile job and the kitchen is finished!

So we had this one last ugly peach wall taunting us...

Not anymore!

Brian found a sweet tile that we could use for the back splash - at Menard's, where else.  It's shiny, white glass that has just a little bit of a blue tint to it.

 As usual with tile, I'm the cutter and Brian's the mudder.  I set up out on the deck - since it's summer now and I won't freeze my fingers off, and the rest of the place is in sweet condition - don't want to wreck it with tile dust.  For this job, I should have asked Dad for his glass tools, because my tile saw was ridiculous overkill and not the best tool for the job.  It turned out great, though.

 It was an appliance jungle in the kitchen since we needed to move things in order to tile around/behind them.

 Whoot!

 It's still a little messy, but we're peach-free!

 Things lined up just right around the mid-counter outlet.

 Under the microwave, we got really lucky with the height of the tile and height of the microwave :)

 Oh, I almost forgot!?!  The counters came in, that's why we were ready to tile!  We got a quartz product, ECO Polarcap - it's a mostly white, with little flecks of gray and sparkle.

 Nearly done, he's taping up for a line of caulk.

 Now, they can get the sink plumbed up and our kitchen will be back in business!!

There we have it, the kitchen is in.  This marks the end of the Superior condo journey.  It was pretty anti-climactic ending with a few, little plumbing tasks.  Nothing like unwrapping from a paint job.
What do you think of our sweet little back splash?  I'll put some furniture/finished product pictures up soon.  Next stage, sit on the market...  Anyone interested?!

Easiest floor I've worked with

We had a lovely weekend with some hikes and friends visiting, and managed to throw down our wood floor.  I've never worked with an easier flooring install (unless you count calling in a contractor for carpet!).  For once, I got to do the "fun" part and Brian was the cutter.

It started a little slow because we had to get our bearings.  

Here's the product we were using.  It's from Menard's, the wood is Acacia.  It's an engineered wood product, so the cost was reasonable, but the look was there.  It's all about getting the look for this place.

The pieces that didn't get cut literally took 5 seconds to put in.  I spent a lot of time during the install waiting for Brian to cut and playing with Noah.  He even put a few pieces in - it was that easy!

There were a number of challenging cuts to fit around the hearth and into the angles of the dining area and kitchen.

Prove out the new floor with a few dance moves while dad's cutting!

Mmm, looking good!

We need to go back at the end to deal with the transition space at the hearth, but the main floor just goes down so fast!

Here's another of those challenging cuts that I got out of, just had to ask my cutter for them and test when the pieces came back.  He sometimes caught up to me when I had to roll out more underlayment and I was playing between cuts instead of working ahead. :)

Here are the final pieces except under the fridge.  We got it tucked in tight at the little wall that separates the hall from the kitchen.  Ended with the right width piece too... Gotta love when a whole piece slides in at the end.

Another kitchen sneak peek.  Our appliances came in, so we had to move them out of the way for floor.  Good thing the floor went fast, we didn't have to have them out of place for very long!

Whew, it's looking sharp!

After the floors, of course, there were counter toe-kicks to install.  Really finished the place off nicely!

Carpet transition anyone?

So, there's our rich mocha floor to ground all the light and white fixtures.  It was super easy to install, down-right fun to work with, and was able to be done in pieces between hiking outings.  I think we worked on the floor in 3 - 2 hour sessions plus Brian spent another couple hours on the transitions.  If you had a regular rectangular room, it would go together so easily.  We had minimal waste until we got into cutting angles, but overall had little enough waste that we got to return one box; we were really close to returning 2, but needed 2 more boards at the very end.
I'm really happy with the product.  It makes the space look so much more finished!  Probably because it is nearly finished, whatever.  Furniture and some kitchen details left to go!