A year ago, we moved into this beautiful house – yes, hard to believe, but it’s been a year!! I want to say – a year already? – where has the time gone?? And at the same time, only a year? – feels like I’ve been here forever!! Either way, it’s been all good – but a retrospective of our first year back is not what this post is about!! It’s about our first big DIY project in this new house…

When we moved in, there wasn’t much home improvement really needed – the custom built upgrades were everywhere! We did put in a water softener and an RO filtration system – the only thing that we felt was needed? A tiled backsplash in the kitchen – easy to clean, and great to look at! So after looking at a few pictures online, I had a vague idea of what I wanted – and I did end up getting quotes from a couple of contractors. But then we had so much going on – one thing after another – and my backsplash project kept being pushed back!!

Meanwhile, our incredibly handy friends – they have pretty much built their own house, along with all the interior detailing – happened to mention that a kitchen backsplash was really easy to put up – looking at you SB!! Until that moment, we had never really considered doing this ourselves – but the idea had taken root, and the more I resisted, the more Ajey was convinced that this was completely doable!! Once RT offered to lend Ajey his “tile-installation kit” – there was no turning back!!

Day 1 – the first step – buying the tile – actually, before that – actually agreeing and deciding which tile we wanted. As always, Ajey wants the snazzy modern look, and I inevitably lean towards the classic. Believe me, finding something that we both like – be it furniture or in this case, tiles – is almost always the hardest part of any project!! The vast array of choices does not make this any easier – and then trying to match different tiles to come up with a design!! An exhausting morning (and part of the afternoon) at Menards, we finally had a unanimous choice!!

So the tile we had picked came in sheets of 12-inch-square – the actual tile was a 2-inch-square, so we had a 6×6 grid to work with. The space under our cabinets was a little less than 13 inches – so there was plenty of tile cutting to be done. Even with that, the under-the-cabinet portion was pretty straightforward – and by the end of Day 2, all the tile was up. What remained was the big square behind the stove – this space is big enough to need some kind of design – but at the end of Day 2, we were reconsidering our decision, the design we had picked out didn’t seem all that attractive anymore…

Day 3 – back to the drawing board, back to Menards!! Another round of back-and- forth and a couple of hours later we had a new design. We were taking it up a notch – decided that we were going to tilt our original tile and then inlay some copper metallic tiles – 1 day and our ambitions were soaring!! To our dismay, the copper tiles were slightly bigger than our base tiles – they wouldn’t drop in neatly as we had expected!! We laid out the design on the counter and decided to go for it – and adjust on the fly – a rookie mistake.

The diamond pattern was harder than expected to put up – and we struggled a bit to get the lines straight and aligned. In the end, it wasn’t perfect – but there wasn’t really much that could be done anymore – and it looked really beautiful, right?? Another exhausting day – but happy with our progress!!

Day 4 – grouting. As we started putting on the grout – another rookie mistake surfaced. When putting up the tile, we hadn’t been wiping away the excess mortar that oozed out between the tiles – and now, the hardened mortar was showing through the grout – that had to go!! Cleaning the mortar – backbreaking – we were literally chipping away at the little bits, and trying to do that without chipping the tile – whew!! Stressful!! What should have been an easy morning’s work turned into a whole day thing!! We did get the grouting done, and then rewarded ourselves with a little picnic in our basement!!

Day 5 was pretty straightforward – put up the outlet faceplates, a layer of the sealant, and a caulk along the countertop – and viola!! Our kitchen is ready to go!! I have to say – I was extremely reluctant to take this on – and I couldn’t be happier with the result!! It was a lot of hard work – blood (Ajey nicked his finger on a tile), sweat, and thankfully, no tears!! A big thank-you to Ajey – the best anniversary gift ever!!

That’s the first week of our Christmas break!! Happy holidays, everyone!!