I feel like THIS week really put the “challenge” in the One Room Challenge! Why, you ask?! Here’s the long short of it…
I seriously loooooove old buildings. My excitement knows no limits when reimagining the spaces of unloved structures. But my dad, who made his living remodeling houses, always told me that it’s harder to fix up something that’s old than to build something new. And I got an unhealthy dose of this very logic during week 6, as we tried to install tile on a sloped ceiling in the attic shower of this 140 year old building. What I thought would take maybe a day, took THREE. It was six stinkin’ tiles! Talk about slow and steady wins the race. How slow can you go? Oh wait, I think that was “how low can you go?”
Things started off great. I had gone to Harbor Freight the night before we began this adventure to get some cargo bars that I guess people use in their trucks and SUVs. They were adjustable. The heads pivoted to fit angles, and the grip could tighten just enough to hold those tiles on the ceiling until they dried. They really were a godsend! So Friday afternoon into the early evening, it felt like we were making progress. Two tricky tiles cut and installed in the matter of two hours, which doesn’t sound like much, but when dealing with an un-square sloped ceiling that’s a huge WIN!
I’m not gonna lie, I did wake up around 4:30AM worried that the tiles must have shifted or the cargo bars failed, etc. You know those middle of the night wake up with anxiety moments? I waited for moral support, so when Finn came over we went to check on it and it was all totally fine! Stupid brain.
We knew we had to line up the black trim before we could put the next two tiles up. This is where things started to slowly go south according to this perfectionist. We had a much larger gap where the grout lines were going to be than I was expecting. And there was nothing to do about it with the first two tiles in place. I had to visually line up the next tiles in the spots that looked the best, but still lined up with the vertical pattern. I added complexity to this project by wanting the line up the grout lines with the back wall, and I was starting to regret that decision! We forged ahead and got the next two tiles on.
Okay, we’re almost there! Now for the weirdo shaped tile with the hole for the light. I cut and trimmed my cardboard tile pattern with the hole. It fit pretty good and I was ready to try cutting an actual tile. My goal was to line up the vertical pattern on the newly cut tile with the tile below it and the also on the wall with the shower fixtures. The pattern did not line up with my grout line cuts. A thunderstorm rolled in and made it way too dark to work in the attic, so we had to quit for the day. I felt tired and defeated, having to spend part of another day on this ceiling.
The next morning I was determined to have a better representation of a tile, so I spent some time cutting a piece of 1/2″ foam board and drawing the linear pattern on it so I could really get the correct angles on my next attempt.
I was never great at geometry. It was the ONLY class in high school that I ever got a down slip in, and it wasn’t for lack of trying. My skills were being tested. I was cutting a trapezoid tile! I got one cut to fit, but I was disappointed in a couple of spots where the tile chipped in the tile saw. Finn thought it was fine, so he got to work with his angle grinder cutting out that precarious circle, which of course he NAILED IT (not literally)! Meanwhile, I cut another tile without the chips, then broke it to him that he would need to cut another circle out. I felt bad, so I bribed him with free hot fresh pizza! And he cut a perfect hole once again.
I cut the last tile to line up before installing the tile with the hole in it, hoping to ward off any evil last minute problems that might pop up. I just reused the foam board tile by taping back on the ends I cut off and refitting it to the last tile spot. Another trapezoid, though not AS trapezoid-y as the other! We lined them up and stuck them up there for good. And just like that (hahahaha), the shower ceiling was done!
So if you can’t figure it out, I’m pretty behind at this point after fighting the ceiling. I keep telling myself, I can only do what I can do and it’s okay to not be done with the room by the last week. The plumbers come on Monday, so I have to tile the floor and get some grouting done where they will be working at. Plus, I’m missing a piece for my shower, that was supposedly in stock when I ordered it, and now is backordered. Trying to go with the flow…
Gotta go start the tiling process for the floor tiles. Join me next week for more misadventures in the attic!
-Michele aka Kiki