You know it makes me wanna GROUT!

Pick my trowel up and GROUT!

Finish those tiles up and GROUT!

OOOOOO!

You're welcome for that.

But seriously, I finally got around to grouting those kitchen tiles. Like, two weeks ago. Sorry I didn't run to the interwebs to tell you. But it is very exciting! The process was nothing short of terrible (SO messy), but the work was worth it.

I totally fell in love all over again with our subway tiles after I filled in all those pesky cracks. The clean, white grout really defines the blue-gray tiles and lightens everything back up. And the brightness of the grout now confirms my desire to paint the walls the same dark color as the tile. BENJAMIN MOORE, I'm coming to you!

In other kitchen news, we've also (finally) begun construction on the cabinet surround for the refrigerator. I read lots of tutorials (like this one and this one), but in the end, we basically had to just wing it. 

We were unable to remove the old cabinet from the wall...it's seriously stuck up there. I don't think we could remove it without totally destroying the one next to it. But a thin piece of ply covered the old door holes right up and now it's the perfect depth for a cookbook shelf. 

We loved the wine rack idea from the second tutorial so we picked up some lumber at Home Depot yesterday and I whipped it up in less than an hour. Though, let's be honest, we never have wine just lying around. On the semi-annual occasion that I buy a bottle for dinner, we open it immediately, drink 1/3 of it, cork it up, and end up throwing the remainder away a month later. Somewhere in the greater Boston area, my vino-loving parents are dying a little inside. But I'm hoping their Thanksgiving visit might mean this little wine rack has a fighting chance of actually doing its job one day. Plus I think it'll be something any future potential buyers would enjoy.

Anyway--there's obviously lots that still needs to be done. Moulding. Caulk. Primer. Paint. But I have my hopes set on finishing the surround before Thanksgiving, so I'm back into project mode. And we would loove to replace the fridge with a counter-depth, energy-star compliant one in the future. But for now, we'll just keep our fingers crossed that a custom built-in can make our current one look a little less blah.

And just to bring you up to speed, here's what's left before we can call this kitchen renovation complete:

• Paint cabinets
• Replace hardware
• Replace countertops and sink
• Install new appliances
• Tile and grout backsplash
• Install can lighting
• Patch holes in ceiling from old fixture
• Build in refrigerator surround
• Install crown moulding
• Repaint walls dark gray
• Do something with the exposed light above the sink (?)

The Subway Stops Here

Oh hey, just me again.

Blogging from the confines of my shrinking living room. What? Rooms don't shrink? Because it seriously feels like the walls are closing in on me. Which might be related to the fact that I haven't really left the house in 3 days. Okay, there was one quick trip to Kroger. For one thing. And I was back within 30 minutes.

Note that my newfound house claustrophobia is not some form of self torture, but rather the result of this parent's worst nightmare. Little A has hand, foot, and mouth disease-- and her baby leprosy has been wreaking quite the havoc around here. I've slept less than 6 hours the last two nights combined, and the oozing sores (too much?) covering my child's body don't seem to be on their way out anytime soon.

In the meantime, we're entertaining ourselves with games like "turn the lights on and off." lots of Nexflix (there's a ridiculous show called Martha Speaks that seems to do the trick), oatmeal baths, and field trips to the kitchen. First, to snack on these honey chai roasted almonds every five minutes (trust me, they're addictive). And second, to admire our new subway tile...which is, after all, the real subject of this post.

Admittedly, half of the kitchen was tiled a week ago-- but I had to wait for another weekend (read: time for Bryan to watch the kiddo) to finish up the other side. While we were at it, we finally switched out all the receptacles and switches to white, tamper-proof outlets. All that's left is bright white grout, and this little project will be d-o-n-e.

I managed to complete the whole project in about 10 hours total, with just a simple tile cutter and nipper. I'm sure a wet saw would have been helpful with pesky corners around outlets and cabinets, but our kitchen is so small that those corners were few, and there were enough spare tiles that I could break a few in the process of trying to get one just right. I found it helpful to wrap Frog Tape around the ones I needed to cut into intricate shapes.

Like every other big update to this room, I think it's a total gamechanger. It's crazy how such a dark tile can actually make the kitchen feel bigger. It almost works like eyeliner, adding depth to the counters and accentuating the place where the countertop meets the wall.  Plus it's so shiny, it kind of has the effect of a mirror in a small room.

Jury's still out on whether the walls will stay painted this color. Right now, they're "Stonington Gray" by Benjamin Moore (which is the color of most of the non-bedrooms on our main level). But this picture is inspiring me to maybe go darker on the walls. I'm going to wait until we build in the fridge and figure out all the last details to make a decision.

Hopefully I'll be back next week with a completed tile job for you! And if you're lucky, I might just bust out the DSLR so you can actually see a clear, true-to-color photo. What can I say... the iPhone is a mom's best friend!