The Chocolate Bathroom

It's finally here. The new bathroom is finally the chocolate bathroom. The actual color Liv picked out is "cocoa bean", but it's chocolate. Grandpa and I primed it Friday night and I got the first coat done Saturday.

I got the new window installed this week too.

Our tile for the step came in this week as well. This shot shows both of our tiles next to the wall and our trim. The main floor tile is on the right and the step tile is on the left...

We will cut the step down to about 3" strips to line the top and front face of our little step down in the middle of the room. At first I was really disappointed that we had to work around that step, but now I'm thinking it will break the room up a little and give a nice multi level feel that you don't normally associate with bathrooms. We'll see.

I got on my CAD machine at work this week and plotted up the room and tried to find the best way to position our tiles. Here's what I came up with...

I'm hoping to get the floor leveled up and get the cement board down this week. Then I'll probably have a week of tile cutting before I'll be ready to stick any down.

On the Move

I finally got a new memory card for the camera this week and finally got some good video of Nate toddling around. Enjoy...

He really is getting quite good at walking. We had another pretty good week working on the bathroom. Logan and Grandpa both stopped in to help a couple times and as of last night we have about 95% of the mudding done and about 80% of the sanding too. We did such a good job with the second coat that there were only select locations that needed a third. I did that Saturday and now all that's left is to sand the 3rd coat and dab a 4th coat in a couple little spots. Here's some new pics, but it probably doesn't look that much different from last time.

Olivia couldn't pass up the chance to capture my dusty mug after a day of sanding...

Thank God for goggles and dust masks. If all goes well this week I'll get the sanding finished up, clean up the dusty floor, and have some color slapped on the walls before next week's update.

Oh By the Way...

Some or most of you may already know this but for those that don't, Olivia and I are expecting another baby in late August or early September. She gave me the green light to make this public knowledge a week or 2 ago, and I kept forgetting to post the news. Since Nate was born on Grandma Dudley's birthday, maybe the next one will show up on Uncle Logan's birthday (September 2).

My New Favorite Tool

Although it may not look like it, we actually got a lot done with the bathroom this week. Grandpa and Uncle Logan came over Tuesday and we finished hanging drywall about 2 minutes before Nathan's bedtime. I did a little mudding on my own Wed and Thurs, but we finally started mudding in earnest Friday evening when Grandpa came back.

On our 45's we used a tape that was recommended to me called strait-flex. It's kinda like a cloth tape that holds an angle. Ours definitely needs some more mud and serious sanding, but it makes a nice line.

On Saturday, Grandpa and Grandma came back again. Grandma took the boy shopping while Grandpa and I finished the mudding. Up until now, my favorite tool for this project was the sawzall. Now my new favorite tool is the 90 degree inside corner trowel. I am soooo glad we bought one. How else could a lunkhead like me with no mudding experience make perfect corners with one swipe. Man is it sweet. We finished mudding early Saturday afternoon so we went ahead and sanded what we were able to.
I'll have a good bit more sanding to do Monday, with coat 2 soon to follow. After sanding there wasn't much we could do except watch mud dry, so Grandma and I took advantage of 60 degree weather in February and took Nathan for a walk. We should have taken the camera, but we didn't. We happened by the playground at the park and Nathan got his first crack at it. He liked the jungle gym and the slides, but his favorite thing was the swing. He LOVED the swings. He cried when we took him out to go home. We'll take the camera next time.

Kermitt's Halftime Special

Ok, it's halftime of the big game, the perfect opportunity to throw together this week's post. Everyone's been asking about how Nathan's walking is coming along. It's amazing how one day he's stumbling every 3 or 4 steps, and then the next day he's gone. Friday he managed to walk un-assisted from the couch to the bathroom. Unfortunately, we haven't got a decent memory card for our new camera yet. The current one only allows us to take like 10 or 15 seconds of video before it's full. So, I've not gotten any good walking videos yet. However, the old one still works from time to time and I was able to get this gem of his first fresh chocolate chip cookie. Excuse the weird color from my weird camera.

With some help from the fam this week, we were finally able to clean out the bathroom and make some space for serious drywalling.

We made big progress. We now lack most of one closet and a lot of little stuff. I think another 2 evenings and we'll be ready for mud. Ugh, mud. But now, back to football.