What a Mothers Day present!

What with Tiffany's graduation, the Sacramento Jazz Jubilee, Memorial Day festivities, and Carolyn between field trips to Humbolt County (far northern coast of California) and Los Angeles County, we thought life around here couldn't get any more hectic. We were wrong. First, Steven and Lisa called to see if they could come visit. Then Richard and Natalie called to say they would like to come for a visit over the Memorial Day weekend. (Actually, now I can't remember who called first.) We were fretting over what things we could encourage people to see and do while we were tied up with Jubilee obligations.

Then when they got here, Natalie suggested they tile our kitchen/dining nook floor. Carolyn's been wanting to do this since we first moved into the house as water damaged had created several unsightly blotches and the linoleum had begun to peel away from the floor or the wall in several places. We had gone so far as to visit several tile stores and some newly built houses to get an idea of what we'd like to have but we hadn't chosen a tile or ever a color yet.

No problem. While Carolyn and Natalie went tile hunting, Richard, Steven, and Lisa pulled up the old flooring - linoleum for the most part but a section of carpeting as well.

With my back acting up, I wasn't good for much of anything other than observing. I couldn't even supervise since they obviously knew more about what they were doing than I did.

With Richard and Steven measuring and cutting, Natalie and Lisa laid the tiles. Carolyn had decided on a 16 inch tile laid on the diagonal which created quite a lot more cuts than we expected and more complexity than they could do with the saw we borrowed from some neighbors. Fortunately, out new Home Depot has a great rental department. After 2 days, we were about 70% done but Steven and Lisa had to go home. They did promise to return next week to finish the project.

Richard and Natalie stayed for another day bringing the project to 90% completion. Richard also installed our new dishwasher saving us $120 and a week's wait for a technician to do it. Steven had installed a new outlet to replace the hard wiring the previous dishwasher had.

Even when I was able to get down and up off the floor again, it would have taken Carolyn and me a couple of weeks to finish a project like this. It certainly changes the look of our kitchen. We're also hoping that any future water seepage will just evaporate through the grout spacing like it has in the laundry room so we shouldn't see any discolorations or damage again.

Thanks Natalie, Richard, Steve, and Lisa.