Next Project: The Bathroom Floor

I've begun prepping for my next home improvement project! Out with the old, worn vinyl bathroom floor and in with a tile floor. Official installation starts this Saturday. Nothing like a little tile work to celebrate Halloween.

Originally I thought I would do 2x2 hex tile, which I LOVE. It's common in older homes from the 1920s and before and I had 1x1 with a flower design in my bathroom at my last apartment.

2x2 white hex tile and a picture of it installed from Subway Tile

But after much number crunching, I just couldn't bring myself to spend the money. I need 36 square feet. The cheapest I could find hex tile is $8 a square foot = $288 plus tax, so let's say $300. Which doesn't seem like much for a new floor. But I also have to buy all the supplies, rent a tile cutter and pay to have it installed because I'm boyfriendless and can't have my man do the job for me in exchange for sexual favors.

So I decided DalTile Octagon and Dot tile was a good alternative. You can buy it from Home Depot for about $2.50 a square foot. That's only $90 for a new floor! I'm going to use a light silver grout.


What You Need to Install a 36 Sqr Foot Tile Bathroom Floor:

• Someone who knows what they're doing - $20-25/hr. if you get a deal. Probably less if you get someone from the Home Depot parking lot.
• Tile - 36 square ft.
• Hardy Board - 3 sheets, about $10/ech (this is cement board that screws to your subfloor and is the sturdy base to support the tile)
• Thin Set - 1 tub, about $20 (this is the mortar you put on top of the hardy board and attach the tile to)
• Grout - 25 lbs bag, $10-15 (goes in between the tiles)
• Tile/Grout sealer - 1 bottle (seals the grout to prevent staining)
• Thin set rake - $3 for a cheap one (to apply the thin set and rake half circle patterns into it)
• 2" deck screws - $5/box (to attach hardy board to subfloor)
• Grout sponge - $2 (not sure what it's for yet)
• Bucket to mix the grout in
  
• Baseboard - you might not need it. I do b/c my vinyl floor runs about 2 inches up on to the wall instead of there being existing trim baseboard around the edge of the floor.
• Floor transition piece
• Shower grout - to seal it by the tub. $4/tube for cheap stuff.
  

My friend Max is doing the installation for me. We went to Home Depot this past Monday and picked up everything on the list above except the grout. I'm looking for a very specific, super light shade of gray that looks more silver to add a little contrast between the tiles (instead of using white). Here's an example of how someone used white tile with silver grout no their walls. Home Depot didn't have what I wanted. Lowe's carries a "pale gray", but they only had it in sanded grout and I think I want non-sanded (they could order that but it'll take two weeks to get here and we start the floor this weekend). So my last stop will be at Arizona Tile on Morena Blvd. I called and they have two light shades in non-sanded for me to check out. And it's actually only $9 for a bag of grout there which is cheaper than the big stores. And here I always assumed specialty shops would be more expensive.

I'm pretty stoked because I think materials and the tile saw should all come under $300, especially since I ended up borrowing some of the supplies from a friend, so I'm going to return a few things this weekend and get $20-30 back. Woo-hoo! Depending on how fast Max works (and how much help I can be), I'm hoping my labor will probably be around $300-350. But less is always better!

The How-To and Before & After portions of this post to follow next week.

And an even more important post next week: the Meet My New Kitties post! As soon as this floor is done, I'm going to the Humane Society and adopting Jackson and Boo, who I wrote a little about last week. I visited them yesterday after work and it was all I could do not to bring them home right then. Jackson crawled into my lap as soon as I sat down, started purring, then fell asleep. After a few minutes, Boo came out of her hiding spot after seeing I wasn't harming her buddy and she laid next to me so I could pet her too. And I finally heard her voice (I've gone to see them every weekend for a month; the workers there are joking they'll have to name a wing after me) and she made a cute little "merp" meow thing. Hopefully I'll get her to purr once she gets more used to me.

So I'm looking forward to having a nice floor in the bathroom, but mostly I'm looking forward to the reward of finally have pets!

I'm Nesting

I haven't decided for sure on the cats I want to adopt yet, but I’m still getting my home ready for them. This weekend I started nesting and buying stuff for when I get my cats (some of these are Hobo Kitty's old toys):

Kitty Cornicopia

Landscaping: Front Yard Plant List

Last week, I posted about my trees being removed and the first draft of the landscaping for my yard that my friend came up with (read post).

Here's the rendering of my yard again:

Over the weekend, Krista sent me my proposed plant list so I know what all that green, yellow, pink, and purple stuff is:

Bulb
Freesia
Daffodill

Herb
Rosmarinus officianalis 'Tuscan Blue'
Mexican Bush Sage

Perennial
Kangaroo Paws orange
Sunset Gold Breath of Heaven
Superior Lemon Yellow Day Lily
Pink European

Shrub
Japanese Boxwood Conical
Pineapple Guava- shrub NOT
Red and Yellow Lantana
India Hawthorn

Succulent
Salad Bowl or Dinner Plate

Tree
Frosty Pink Angel's Trumpet
White Crepe Myrtle Tree

Vine
Carolina Jessamine

And I sent her the measurements of my current, LAME porch, that she needs so her carpenter can work on making the one in the rendering above a reality.

My current porch/entry way. It used to have posts and a railing on the outer edge, but there was termite damage so when they tented my house, I just had them tear them out rather than replace it. That saved me about $175 and I knew at some point I'd be doing something to fix up this entryway. Or rather finding someone to come up with an idea to help me fix up this entry - thanks Krista!

Crazy Cat Lady

I'm destined to become a crazy cat lady. I'm on my way to spinsterhood and I love cats, so really, there's not much I can do about it. I accept my fate.

I get love from Sara's cats, Kitty and Tanner, whom I watch whenever she and Jason go on vacation (which is luckily a couple times a year). And I just spent almost two weeks taking care of Matt's girls, Sentry and Meekah, spending almost 3 hours a night with them; not so much because they needed the attention, but because I did. Now that I own my own home and I'm mostly settled in, it's time for me to be a kitty owner again!

I had the best cat ever in Hobo Kitty about 4 years ago; he was a neighborhood cat that stayed with me most the week. But it turned out he had owners (he was an outdoor cat for them) and they took him away when they moved. I miss that cat.

Hobo Kitty cuteness overload

So I've begun my quest for a new cat. Except I've been convinced I should get two so they can keep each other company while I'm not home. Looking for two cats is hard! It's literally been as much effort and consideration as looking for my first house.

With one cat, you just hang out with all the cats and see which one you like best. But a bonded pair of cats is harder to come by and then you have two personalities to deal with (I've been encountering a lot with one really shy one in the pair or they're cats over 8 years old). It would be easier if I wanted to get some 8 week old kittens from the same litter because there are tons of those around. But I'm looking for cats that are at least a year old.

I went in to this not wanting kittens. But then of course I went over to a foster cat lady's house two weeks ago to meet a 3 year old bonded pair of black cats, Miranda and Stu, and they shared their room with an adorable 6 month old kitten. So now I'm sort of thinking MAYBE and older kitten would be okay... mostly because they'll bond to me quicker than older cats.

But unless some amazing pair shows up on craigslist this week, I think I'm going to adopt Boo (gray with green-yellow eyes, although they call her blue) and Jackson (white and orange calico, although they call it red and white) from the Humane Society off Morena Blvd.

I saw them for the first time about a month ago, but they were stressed out because they had just been put in a new room with a lot of cats. So I went back a couple weeks later to see if they were settled in yet and they seemed pretty cool. Boo is a bit more timid and shy but I think it's because she hates being a room with 10 other cats. Jackson doesn't seem to mind and just mills about and likes to be pet.

I went back this weekend to visit them again, and now Boo was out and about in the room and looked more comfortable, although she'd swat at any cats other than Jackson who got too close to her. I spent a lot of time observing them both from the window and saw their personalities more. Boo will run up to the volunteers when they come in, I assume because she recognizes them, and Jackson was really friendly and cute with anyone. Especially boys. When I finally went in the room, Boo and I had a good petting session on the bench and Jackson crawled into my lap at the same time so I had then both. Jackson really likes to play too, so we played for a while. It's fun watching cats eyes dilate and get super big/black when they're stimulated.

I asked one of the volunteers if they were still pretty bonded to each other since they've been in since July and I was concerned they may have lost their bond since they've been sharing a room with so many cats. She said yes they're still very bonded. They sleep together in the chair and groom each other and will share a lap for pets. I guess they even tried separating them at one point (it's hard to adopt out a pair of cats) but Boo is really attached to Jackson and didn't do well, so they put them back together.

Stay tuned; if I decide to make the leap with this cute pair, it'll be next weekend. Here are some terrible profiles of Boo and Jackson on Petfinder.com; most other oganizations who post animals on this site include nice bios that actually tell you about the animal's personality and better pictures.

Aesthetics vs. Environment: Tree Removal

I feel completely guilty about it, but I've LOATHED the two huge Junipers that obscured the front of my house since I bought it. I really appreciate how old and big they are, but I hate Junipers. They're ugly and cheap looking. I also have not-so-nice feelings about the cheap, purple plum tree in front of the house. And that's the one I SHOULD like because it's totally goth. But those purple trees just remind me of low-income landscaping. Not to mention the off-center placement in the yard.

This is how my house looked the day I bought it.

Anybody who talked to me when I first got the house knows I was always complaining about the ugly trees and talking about how eventually I'd get them taken out, despite feeling bad about removing old trees. The one good thing about Junipers is they don't wreck the pipes; I guess certain trees are notorious for the roots growing in to the pipes and the foundation. Juniper roots don't attack like that.

Well I remember this very vividly because it was my last day of work, September 16, 2009. I left work at 11am super stoked to be free of my job after 7 years and I went for a very uncrowded lunchtime surf at 11th Street in Del Mar. When I got out around 1:30 and got to my car, I noticed I had a voicemail from my friend Krista. She wanted to let me know not to be surprised the next morning when two guys with chainsaws showed up at my door. She was sending them over to cut down my trees!

What a friend, right? Well, she's actually a landscape designer (Krista Percival Landscape Design in Del Mar, CA) and we're doing a service swap. She gets a website, I get a front yard! And she decided the trees had to go (I would have talked about removing them for a year before I actually did it).

So Thursday morning two men and a big truck with a wood chipper showed up and went to work:

Part way through: the middle tree is gone and half of the Juniper on the left.

By the end of the day, it was done:

I admit it looks pretty pathetic now. The trees annoyed me because they hid it, but they also made it appear bigger because you couldn't see it. And now I notice the color more and it's horrible.

But I've put all my faith in Krista. I may be able to do graphic design, but I'm clueless about landscaping. I don't even have vision. But I know she'll make it look amazing because I've seen all the before and after pictures of the other properties she's done. And I'm pretty lucky - she works with really high end clients. I'm honored my little Rolando bungalo is getting her attention!

This week she sent me over a first draft of a rendering for my design. I told her I want a porch and no grass and that I'm probably going to paint my house yellow becuase I've always wanted a yellow house. She's come up with this neat Mediterainian inspired design:
How pretty will my house look in a few months?!?

Mid-Century Modern Furniture

I absolutely love mid-century modern furniture. I check craigslist on almost a daily basis, just to see what's out there. But over the past few years, I've already bought almost all new furniture so I don't need anything new. And it's all dark wood, where mid-century is typically a lighter color so to buy a new piece here or there would really make it mis-matched.

I do however need to buy two things: a couch and some bookshelves/cabinets for the office now that I don't have built ins.

I lucked out and found an awesome set of shelves on Overstock.com that have a mid-century feel with their shape and the spindle legs, but comes in a two-tone dark wood design that goes with my existing furniture. They're made by Sitcom Furniture who is quickly becoming my favorite furniture maker. I bought two of their office shelves from their now-discontinued Audrey furniture collection, for about $200 each.

Audrey Office Shelf by Sitcom Furniture

I also found a cool couch at Macy's from their Corona collection, but have been sitting on the fence about it. And I'm glad I did, because while I was shopping at Underground Furniture in Pacific Beach, I saw a couch in the window that I fell in love with. I had actually seen this couch online and not liked it at all. But in person, it's the perfect couch for me. Has mid-century lines, is totally comfortable, made out a of good fabric, and comes in three cool colors (brown, green, and a burnt red) and is reasonably priced.

Jordan couch by Sitcom Furniture

It'll probably take me two more months to jump off the deep end and actually BUY a couch, but at least I've found two I like and just need to suck it up and throw down the cash. It's always scary spending more than $500 at one time on a single thing!

I've been eying the Enzo bedroom set at Jerome's as well. I never expected to find something cool at Jerome's; they're very traditional. but this set has a cool shape and I was actually surprised by how much I liked the walnut and cream two-tone veneer. I don't really like the headboard, but I like the frame. If I bought a new bedroom set though, that would feel like a total splurge. I need a frame for my bed, but I have perfectly nice dressers already. But not cool like these =) Although the drawers are on the shallow side which is helping me keep my pocketbook closed. For now...

Before & After: Painted Rooms

I'm baaaaack....Sadly, I've been sitting on this post since July. I've just been THAT lazy about getting the pictures cropped. Because what use is a before and after post without pictures? I could paint you beautiful pictures with my words, about the richness of the green in my hallway, the warmth of the cappaccino in the living room, the coolness of my new bedroom walls. But really, it's not like you guys are Stevie Wonder. You've got eyes and you want to use them for more than reading. So let's begin, shall we?

It's been about 10 years since I've painted. And now that I'm done (practically) painting my whole house, I hope it'll be another 10 before I have to do it again!

Things I've learned:

• You ALWAYS needs to do two coats. Even if you primed. Even if you're painting white on white. A-L-W-A-Y-S two coats. Boo.
  
• Painting trim & crown moulding blows.
• You can reuse painters tape. Yes, I'm that frugal.
  
• Wash your rollers and brushes yourself if you have people helping you that way you can only blame yourself if they don't get cleaned well enough to reuse (sorry, Stephen).
• Don't paint the same weekend a killer surf swell comes in. Surfing twice a day plus painting for 5 hours in between surf sessions leads to immobility.

Amber's Painting Bootcamp
Before we get to the pics, let me take a minute to whine about how sore and exhausted I am! Like I said above, I surfed a ton while I was painting. Southern California got a rare, extremely good summer swell the weekend I had dedicated to painting (remember, I started this post around July 27th, for the surfers reading, that's when we got the super awesome swell in for a few days). So my painting weekend was more like a bootcamp workout (I assume; I've never worked out).

Saturday & Sunday:
9-11:30ish Surf Black's Beach, then climb back up the 1/4 mile cliff by the Torrey Pines Glider Port
1-5:30pm paint, paint paint. I already knew painting was hard on the arms, but it's just plain painful after paddling against a current for hours. Plus stepping up and down off the step-stool added a whole extra level of physical endurance to the process. I bet by the end of the weekend I'd done several hundred steps.
6-8pm Surf Black's. Paddle, paddle, paddle, catch my first overhead wave. Haul exhausted butt up cliff.

I was physically exhausted all weekend and by Monday the actual pain started to set in when I woke up and couldn't really move.

The Living Room
Team Kelly came over on Saturday to help me with the living room. They kicked ass! Hayden is a SUPER fast painter and taper. Hayden in action:


And Kristen...well, Kristen looks cute when she's sweaty. See:

And she does excellent clean up work. (she paints good too!)

Thanks to them I was able to get a first coat on the living room and did the second coat myself on Sunday. Did the baseboard trim during the week. Here's the final result:

BEFORE
Cream walls. Blah. Not terrible. Bot not terribly pretty either.

AFTER

The Breakfast Nook
I took Monday off and did the nook myself (you'll remember Stephen helped me tape and prime this room previously).

BEFORE (way before...the wallpaper is still up!)

AFTER

Mater Bedroom
I did this room on my own. Walls Sunday and Monday. Trim Monday and Tuesday. I'm so excited to not have to look at the primed walls anymore (it was primed for 5 weeks)!

BEFORE

AFTER (yeah, you can't really tell the color, but it's one of my favorites in the house)
AFTER (night time, color looks different)

So I did those 3 rooms at the end of July. Then I had to wait for payday so I could buy more paint and tackle the rest of the house.

Kitchen
I picked this green mostly because I like how it looks next to the blue in the nook when you look that direction. The whole kitchen needs to be redone (I want to sand and stain the cabinets a dark walnut and replace the gold, blingin' hardware). I'm a little mad because I bought the wrong paint. I got a semi-gloss instead of the satin which is less shiny. So I might have to repaint. Luckily there's hardly any wall and it's pretty quick. Except I have to tape again... =(

BEFORE

AFTER

Hallway and Trim
Here's the hallway. Not much to say, but I really love this color! And this was probably the worst because of all the doors and trim (I still have to paint all the doors and half the trim; but it's primed).

BEFORE (waaaay before, there's still carpet!)

AFTER

Guest Bedroom
I'm on the fence about what I did with this room. I went out on a limb and bought some dark colors and it's just really masculine and makes the room feel smaller. But the light bedding and furniture tones it down a bit. And every male that's visited always comments on the color of this room and how much they like it, but say nothing about the rest of the house =)

BEFORE

AFTER

So that's it. I only have one room left, the office. I'm leaning toward orange/something warm.

I really like how all my rooms have turned out, except the guest room but it's grown on me the past few months. Paint makes a big difference. Plus it just makes it feel more like mine. Particularly since I did 85% of it on my own.