I've been saving this post forever thinking that I'd eventually finish the floor and take after pictures, but I've come to accept that's not going to happen anytime soon. So, here's the story of our floor with an anti-climactic result!
As if it were some kind of sick joke, we woke up to THIS in our house on Wednesday, November 9th, just TWO days after Hailee had broken her arm (see last post) and the day before her birthday. You have GOT to be kidding me. This is our kitchen...We busted out the ol' shop vac and loads of towels thinking we could take care of this on our own.
I wondered if some of it may have gone into the basement and sure enough...the water had leaked down into the ceiling and onto the carpet.
At that point, we realized we'd better call the insurance company. Within hours, our house looked like it was the one in ET. They put plastic up covering doorways and we had about 15 fans blowing through our house. I came home from work with the kids and as soon as we walked in the door, Jake burst into tears (he's pretty sensitive)..."Our house is broooken!" Ty was working late since he stayed while the insurance company came, so I did what any normal person would do...turned around and walked right back out the door. We had a lot of meals out over the next week or so. The house was completely unlivable, especially since it was in both of our main areas (upstairs and down). The bedrooms were the only places not in complete disarray.
The fan thing lasted about 2 weeks. They kept coming back to take measurements on the moisture levels. They tore up my kitchen floor and the carpet in the basement and poked all kinds of holes through my sheetrock, it was unbelievable. After the house was officially "dry", the insurance company came back and did a full assessment of the damage. It did a lot more damage then I ever thought it would be. Well, I felt like at that point, I didn't even have time to think about it. The holidays were just beginning and Hailee had her whole arm thing going on. We just had to put it on the back burner until January.
The first week in January, we were ready to dig in (I was pretty sick of my plywood kitchen floor by then). We could either have our floor replaced with some new lovely linoleum or if we wanted to do our own labor, we could have beautiful tile in the kitchen. Ty and I deliberated over that for some time, but in the end, I won:) Honestly, if I had known then what I know now, I probably wouldn't have done it. I had NO idea what we were getting into. For one thing, my house looked like this for a WEEK (upstairs and downstairs). In hindsight, I shouldn't have had them done at the same time because again, our only escape from the chaotic mess was our bedrooms.
Night 1 (5 hours). We installed the backerboard. Oh. My. Gosh. This was definitely the worst part of it all. Geez, and I just thought we had to put in tile??? The measuring and the cutting and the puzzle fitting, I got more than a few "told you so" looks from Ty that night. We would NOT have been able to do any of this without my dad's help. He was there every step of the way. And in the interest of full disclosure, despite my promise to help, I was pretty worthless during this step. This was a man's job, for sure.
Night 2 (5 hours). Cementing and nailing the backerboard down. And somehow all the pieces didn't always fit back together again, so there was more cutting. Oh, check it out...there's Ty's "look". Even my dad was flipping me off in the picture I took just before this one, I thought I'd leave that one out:)
Day 3 (8 Hours). The tiling. Now this day, I was fairly helpful, I think. We also were lucky enough to have a couple other volunteers to help us out (one of my colleagues and her husband). We did a little service trade where Ty provided them some IT support. So 5 people for 8 hours straight, are you kidding me?? 40 hours of work. Again, I had NO idea!
Day 4 (3 hours). Grouting. This was oh so much easier. We were coming into the home stretch. I was liking the look and feeling (almost) like it was all worth it. This time my dad and Ty's cousin came over to help.
And now...I really love the tile (and the new carpet downstairs) and maybe someday, I will post the official "after" picture. I'm sure you will all be on the edge of your seat until then! :)
