Category: upstairs

so we thought we’d quickly pop down to lowe’s tonight to return an item and buy a toilet…

the lowe’s we usually go to is in san bruno and as we drove down 101 we saw a new lowe’s in south san francisco, right next to the freeway. we quickly exited 101 and thought we’d just cross over and find the store. the red line indicates the first part of our lost journey, the blue line shows where we’ve doubled back on our path, the green line shows still more doubling back and finally reaching our destination. and wouldn’t you know it? when we finally got to their “grand opening” they didn’t have anything on our list, not even the toilet (they carry 3, maybe 4 models and we needed a specific model because of the size of our bathroom.)

so we made a bee-line to home depot and found everything we needed. they had only one of our toilet left in stock. the box containing the entire thing, didn’t fit in our tiny car, but mathew opened the box, transferred it’s contents and we were on our way. (we seem to have a love-hate relationship with both of these stores. mathew mostly shops at our local stores: cole hardware and benjamin moore: house of color. both stores we LOVE.)

as soon as we got home mathew carried the pieces upstairs to see if they’d fit. only just! he’ll have to make a few changes with the wainscoting behind the toilet, but we’re keeping it!

if we’d planned ahead we might have placed the toilet at an angle in the corner (for more legroom.) but really! what a bunch of fuss, over a toilet!

a while back i stopped asking mathew, “when is it going to be pretty?”

pretty started this sunday with the help of my parents. they showed up this morning ready to paint. my dad even cooked lunch! and there were cream puffs for dessert made by my mom.

while i sanded trim, my dad painted the walls and ceiling, and my mom painted details and baseboards, mathew finished the cutting and placing of tiles.

we were still trying to decide whether to use these larger green tiles (given to us by a friend.) now i think we’re going to go with the smaller travertine tiles to match the rest of the shower. the entire shower floor slopes toward the drain so smaller tiles fit the curves easier. but we’d still like to use the green tiles somewhere because they are quite beautiful handmade tiles. maybe in the kitchen?

the primer is done. one more coat of paint (and once the bathroom is done) we can move in!

mathew spent the first part of the day doing woodworking and paint prep in the bedroom. as the sun started setting we got to work on more tile.

mathew cut solid slabs of travertine into shower shelves and figured out how to round and polish the cut edges. he did all of the cutting and i laid most of the tile.

we worked on the bathroom for 6 hours saturday night (!) but in the end it was really satisfying to be almost done with the tile and shower.

for fun we often conceptualize t-shirts for people. “i’m with grumpy” is what my t-shirt usually says…

the day started out nice enough. a sunny mission district day. mathew put the final coat of plaster on the ceiling. i stripped paint off of wainscoting.

and then i started putting up tile (which started out stressful!) just to my right mathew was putting up more kerdi-membrane (which was also stressful.) so we’re working in this tiny space, tripping over each other, making messes and having difficulties. at one point mathew said, “i’m putting up this piece of wood and it might fall on you.” um, thanks?

luckily tile cutting worked out great. my dad loaned us his tile cutter and it was able to cut our 1″ travertine tile expertly, even really thin pieces weren’t a problem. thanks dad!

mathew finished sanding the bedroom ceiling and walls; they are now ready for paint! and instead of feeling like he’d accomplished something he said he felt like we wasted the weekend. huh? i beg to differ, we’re ready for paint and look! there’s tile!

here we’re trying to decide what to do with the shower curb, cut tiny travertine, cut green tiles or cut-to-fit solid travertine (not shown.) and mathew just needed to be fed, with a full tummy he’s now upstairs finishing up the kerdi-membrane. now i will have no more excuses for not working on that tile…

mathew spent leap day shopping for supplies and working on bathroom wainscoting.

i did tile prep which included math, more math, and drawing out lines on the wall (which are very faint in this photo.) and now that mole is back working upstairs it means lots of random photos just because i think they’re pretty! like a blue window with orange kerdi-membrane.

or flourescent orange chalk line dust (cheeto dust.) or pretty and compostable wood shavings…