Finishing our kitchen backsplash

A few weeks ago, we found beautiful white tiles at a store in Alexandria and I knew they were meant for our kitchen backsplash. So one Sunday, we spent all day installing the tile. The tiles are larger than a classic subway tile and have a gorgeous subtle texture to them. We considered two different patterns: herringbone or subway

Thank god Jeremy had the foresight to double check that the range hood fit between the two cabinets before we started. The hood is 41 inches wide and space between the two wall cabinets was supposed to be 42 inches. We lifted the hood into place and GUESS WHAT!? It didn’t fit! While I had a panic attack, Jeremy used his brain and discovered that the left cabinet had about half an inch of room left so he simply slid it over some more. CRISIS AVERTED, let’s move on.

Before we could start the project, Jeremy had to install an outlet that the range hood will be plugged into. We had paid an electrician to “rough in” the wiring a few months ago, so yesterday Jeremy quickly installed the outlet in its place that will be hidden behind the hood.

Installing the outlet for the range hood before we begin tiling

We decided to go with a herringbone pattern instead of subway tile pattern even though subway tile is much easier and faster to install. We watched a bunch of videos online about how to install tile in a herringbone pattern and then we started to try it ourselves. The first step was to lay out all the tiles on a flat surface in the exact size and pattern we wanted them on the wall. I laid out a drop cloth to protect the floor from scratches, then started laying out the tile one by one, with 1/8-inch spacers between.

Laying out the tile one the floor in the exact pattern it will be on the wall

Laying all the tiles out and cutting the edges off

After I laid enough out, I taped and marked the edges of the wall where I’d need to make cuts. Then I used a simple tile cutter we bought at the hardware store to score and cut each tile. This tool is good for simple jobs and thin tiles, and I only accidentally broke 10 tiles the entire day.

FE7F7040-2DC4-45C5-8149-6A781BD3BE42 — There is no reason for this gratuitous picture except to show the world how CUTE my foreman is.

While I cut all the edges of the tiles, Jeremy was tasked with making the very difficult 90-degree cuts in four pieces of tile. This task is almost impossible for reasons I won’t get into, but suffice it to say Jeremy spent hours trying and only managed to complete two out of the four cuts we needed. Oh well, we decided to move on and just call a handyman to come over with a more advanced tile cutter to make the last few cuts we needed.

Trying to cut a 90-degree angle into the tile….basically an impossible task that I gave to Jeremy. Many tiles were sacrificed

To start installing the tiles, we smeared pre-mixed thinset onto the wall using a notched trowel. HOT TIP: If you want to install your own backsplash, be sure to pick the correct color thinset! Thinset mortar comes in either gray or white and the color only matters if you want white grout lines. We selected white thinset for this reason.

Applying the first bit of thinset onto the walls. PROTECT YOUR CABINETS WITH TAPE!!

We also smeared a thin layer of thinset onto the back of each tile (which is deliciously called “back-buttering” in the industry) and then stuck each tile into place on the wall. We tried to use spacers but gravity kept winning and they kept falling to the ground. We managed to stick some spacers in but definitely not as many as we probably should have.

We of course ran into some problems during installation (namely some of the pre-cut tile didn’t perfectly fit along the ceiling or walls) but we were able to quickly cut new tile pieces that fit better and it all worked out. The entire project took us about 9 hours, including the freak-out about the range hood, installing the outlet, and spending a lot of time on those difficult right-angle cuts. If I were to do the project again, I would not pre-cut ALL the tiles, but rather just one of the straight edges. This is because some of my cuts were a 1/4-inch or 1/2-inch wrong, which could be avoided by just measuring once they are on the wall.

A few days later, after our handyman cut the last few tricky pieces, we grouted in Brilliant White and then BOOM our backsplash was finished!

Or so we thought…there was a slight haze left of the tiles from the grout, so Jeremy used grout haze remover (because there’s a product for everything), and wiped each tile clean. Then he applied a thin line of white caulk on the edges of the backsplash, where the tiles meet the cabinets and countertop.

Because we had tried to squeeze the range hood into place when the cabinets were too close together, I had to do some paint touchups where we had scratched the cabinets. The thinset and grout also left ugly marks on our cabinets, so if you plan to do your own backsplash, protect your cabinets with painters tape! I wish we had.

Then we moved on to install the range hood. Jeremy cut a hole through the ceiling drywall and pulled the duct through. He installed the support screws directly in the tile for the hood to sit on. Then Elizabeth came over and helped up lift the hood into place. Jeremy screwed a third screw directly through the back side of the hood (just for extra support because why not?). Then he connected the duct and tested it out! It worked, but made an annoying rattling sound when he turned it on. He fiddled around with some screws and thankfully it stopped making that strange noise.

The last step was putting the chimney and crown molding over the duct and VOILA! We have a fully functioning range hood! It’s SO big and it really pulls the kitchen together. We love it. Now that ACTUAL last step to completing the kitchen is to paint those last two dastardly cabinet doors.

Learning from design mistakes: IKEA/Semihandmade Kitchen edition

When Jeremy and I decided to take on the roles of general contractor and designer, we knew we’d make mistakes along the way. So far, we’ve made several mistakes that revealed themselves only after purchasing or installing materials. The most frustrating mistake we’ve made was in the design of the kitchen. I’m sharing what we learned so you don’t make the same mistakes we did.

Mistake one: Wall cabinets too high above the countertop.

Our house came blessed with very tall ceilings. I wanted to take advantage of this height and install a VERY tall pantry with tons of vertical storage space. In our kitchen plan, I placed a 15”-high wall cabinet on TOP of an 85”-high cabinet like this:

Kitchen 1a — Industry standards should be followed for a reason. The wall cabinets were too far away from the countertops below

The problem with this design is that all the wall cabinets must be mounted at the same height as the highest point in my pantry. I thought it would be fine to have our wall cabinets “higher than standard” but when they were installed it was immediately apparent what a horrible choice I had made. I could barely reach into the wall cabinet (to grab plates/glasses) let alone reach the higher shelves. Luckily we realized this error on the first day of our kitchen installation, so Jeremy and I rented a van and drove to IKEA to purchase a different size pantry. In the end, we lost only 5 inches of vertical storage space by replacing the super tall pantry with a 90” high cabinet instead.

Kitchen 2a

While this mistake was relatively easy to remedy (and IKEA gave us store credit for the two cabinets we returned), it unfortunately means I will have to buy 2 new doors from Semihandmade and paint them again (remember this post about how many rounds of spraying they required?) because the ones I already have no longer fit. Ugh.

Lesson learned: While I wish that someone at IKEA’s kitchen department had pointed out this error, I suppose I have myself to blame. I knew I was going against industry standard but thought the vertical storage space was worth it. It was not. Do not repeat my mistake!

Mistake two: Purchased wrong size panel for under island.

The process of buying our doors and side panels from Semihandmade was a little nerve-wracking: I sent them our kitchen plan from IKEA’s 3D planning website and Semihandmade sent back a list of all the doors and side panels we would need. It is the customer’s responsibility to review and ensure the sizes of the doors and panels are all correct. Well I made the mistake of buying a huge side panel for under our island that was actually too small! Grrrr. The piece I bought was only 26 inches tall, when it should have been 36 inches tall. (FYI 36 inches is the standard countertop height in kitchens–the key to purchasing the correct size panel!). The piece I bought was actually meant to cover the side of a refrigerator. Blast! What a waste of time and money. Oh well, now I need to order the correct piece and paint it blue. We decided not to delay installing the rest of the kitchen since it would take several weeks to receive and paint this final piece–so for several weeks, the underside of our kitchen island was ‘naked’

Panel missing under the island thanks to my mistake!

Lesson learned: Make sure all side panels that go next to an island or base cabinet are 36 inches high!

BONUS lesson learned: IKEA has an ‘as-is’ sale section near check-out and they sell individual kitchen items for $20 per piece. We decided to buy this one panel from IKEA instead of semihandmade, and saved over $300 by buying an ‘as-is’ piece. If you’re painting your semihandmade cabinets yourself, I highly recommend buying your side panels at IKEA and saving a bunch of cash.

Mistake three: Cabinet door paint dried poorly

Scary close up of the strange paint job. Why so many bumps?!

This one I am perhaps most upset about. The final round of painting our cabinets did not go so well. I have no idea why but let’s blame the weather–it was less than 40 degrees outside when I applied the final coat of paint. And it dried TERRIBLY! It looks like my cabinets have acne. We didn’t have time to sand and re-paint before the installers came in December, so we decided to just install them now and deal with re-painting them in the spring. The good news is that only about 3 or 4 pieces turned out so bad they’ll need to be re-painted. The rest look amazing.

Lesson learned: Get your doors professionally painted or wait for warm weather to do it yourself.

Some tips on how to design your kitchen correctly:

Ensure there is enough clearance for people to comfortably walk through doorways, passageways, hallways, and around islands. We decided to make the passageway between the fridge and the island 47 inches wide, which is industry standard for “two cooks in the kitchen.” We also made sure the clearance between the island and any obstacle was 39-40 inches. The minimum you’d want to go is 36 but we bought huge appliances so we needed the extra clearance.
Similarly, make sure there’s enough clearance for someone to stand in front of the appliances with the doors open. At another property we looked at, you couldn’t swing the fridge open while standing in front of it because the island was in the way.
If you buy your kitchen at IKEA, make sure you fully understand where the white cabinet interiors will show around your doors and panels. We were surprised after our kitchen was installed that you could see a sliver of the white cabinet frame which we did NOT like. So we installed a second piece of panel/filler to hide the frame and make it look more custom built in.

Rage and tears on move-in day

We interrupt your regularly scheduled and curated DIY content to give you some real talk about home renovations: it is hard and stressful and anxiety-ridden. Today I’m going to be honest about some of the harder aspects of our renovation, especially in light of the fact that we moved out of Liz and Harry’s house before Christmas and have settled into our half-finished home.

We decided to move into our house after one bedroom and the guest bathroom were fully finished and our kitchen was almost fully installed. We moved in the week of Christmas and spent two nights in our home before traveling for 5 days to visit friends and go to a wedding in other states. When we arrived back to our house after 5 days away, I immediately lost my shit and burst into tears. You see, we have worked on our house almost every day since August 15th, but we always had Liz and Harry’s warm and welcoming home as a safe-haven to retreat to each night. I feel like we have pushed ourselves out of the nest and barely know how to fly . But we wanted to move into our home when it became livable so now was the time.

In addition to feeling scared to live in a half-finished construction zone, I’m extremely upset with a major purchase we made that is impossible to un-do. I am fully unsatisfied with our new hardwood floors. I cannot believe how easily they dent and scratch. I feel rage pumping through my body every time I notice a new dent (which is constant), yet we are stuck with the floors now that they’ve been installed and our kitchen was placed on top of them. The hard learned lesson that I impress upon all of you is NEVER to buy Birch floors. We had told the salesman our two priorities when selecting our new flooring were price and durability. He sold us garbage and I will never forgive him! But now I need to learn to embrace the “distressed” and scratched look, because it will be that way for the rest of time.

Finally, I am realizing that my beloved blue kitchen cabinets that I hand painted are very susceptible to dings and scratches. Cue more rage flowing through my body. I thought the expensive Benjamin Moore Advance paint (which is specifically marketed for painting cabinetry) would be durable enough but it is obviously not. So now I need to remove all the doors and hardware, and cover with a polyurethane seal. I’d prefer to wait until spring when the weather is warmer but then I run the risk of many more dings and scratches that would need to be painted over. UGH UGH UGH!! All I can say it thank GOD Jeremy has such a positive attitude, because if we were both miserable about these issues, our household would not be a happy place.

Besides being scared to live in an unfinished home and feeling frustrated at the floor and cabinets, I’m proud to say that our house looks pretty incredible. It’s only half done, but we have really brought it such a long way since we purchased it in the summer. We have a ton of work to accomplish this month, including installing the baseboard trim around the first level of the house, installing the toilet, sink, walls, and paint the soon-to-be new powder room, and put up walls and a ceiling in the back bonus room. Every week there is progress, and I have to keep reminding myself to control the tears and rage and look on the positive side.

Painting our kitchen cabinets

For our kitchen, we bought the cabinet frames from IKEA to keep the budget under control, but opted to purchase the door fronts from a higher-end vendor called Semihandmade. I had discovered this company a year ago and was so intrigued by their business model. They design high quality, real-wood doors that exactly fit all IKEA kitchen cabinets, for clients who want an affordable kitchen from IKEA but desire a higher-end, more custom look. We opted for the DIY option, which meant they’d delivered raw, unfinished cabinet doors that we could paint whatever color we desired. This option was appealing for several reasons: 1) obviously the budget–it was the least expensive product they sell and 2) I didn’t love their color options (they only had about 10 color options that were all very neutral) and was interested in picking the PERFECT color that was just right for me.

Well let me tell you, painting these doors was a WAY greater endeavor than I could have expected. I had read blog after blog of other women who had painted the DIY cabinets themselves but no one ever mentions how time consuming it is, or how heavy these doors are! I opted to apply one layer of primer and then two layers of color. But since I could only paint one side at a time, that was essentially 6 rounds of spray painting. We decided to use a paint sprayer instead of a brush for a more even application of the paint.

We received the cabinets on November 9th, and had until December 12th when our kitchen was scheduled to be installed to finish all six rounds of spraying. We were limited to days when the weather was not windy, rainy, or snowy (since the spraying was in the back yard), and of course we had to start before 2 PM to beat the early winter sunset. We had less than 5 weeks. Could we make the deadline? We sure were going to try!

November 11: I borrowed the paint spraying gun from our trusted handyman and set to work on the first round of primer. I set up our two saw horses with 2X4s and immediately realized I would need a WAAAAAY larger staging area to paint all 37 individual pieces of wood doors, trim, and panels.

After a LOT of troubleshooting, I started the first round with primer in the sprayer. I had to get the top of each door, plus the sides. The paint sprayer was a bit fussy and sometimes shot out a large glob of paint. To avoid this, I added water to thin the primer. It took me about an hour to do all 37 pieces, and I cursed SO many times I was afraid of what the neighbors thought. But I learned a lot that first round. We brought the doors inside after a few hours to finish drying.

November 19: I did the same set-up and spray painted the other side of each door with primer. This time was a bit easier since I had already painted the edges, I only had to cover the tops of each piece this time. Plus I applied the lessons I learned in the first round: thin the primer a lot so it’s almost the consistency of whole milk; hold a paper towel below the nozzle to catch those hated paint drips; never let the canister reach near-empty levels.

November 21: I had the day before thanksgiving off of work and thankfully the weather was a sunny 48 degrees, so I hauled each piece into the back yard yet again for the first round of color application! We selected Benjamin Moore Advance Paint, which is meant for kitchen cabinets–it’s a more expensive paint but it dries extra hard for added durability and longevity. I selected the same dark blue color as our staircase wall, Champion Cobalt, so that once the kitchen is installed, the entire south wall of our home will be the same color.

November 24: On the Saturday after Thanksgiving, my aunt and uncle came over and, like champs, helped to sand down any bumps and paint drips on the doors. Unfortunately some paint dripped down the sides during my previous application and resulted in small pools of paint along the edges. Cardinal and Joanie are professional handymen on boats in Annapolis, so they arrived just when I needed them the most: Cardinal showed me how to sand down the doors while Joanie carefully sanded and cleaned them off. They also helped us move 30 sheets of plywood from the curb into our house (god bless them)!! They worked in beast mode the entire time and I could truly see the Surette genes in action (we hate to slow down and are constantly cleaning things).

Cardinal and Joanie carefully sanding each piece

My amazing aunt and uncle carried all our plywood up the stairs for us!

Luckily, this was the FINAL application for the 2 huge pieces and the 6 long skinny pieces, since I am only painting one side of them (they will be screwed into place so we’ll never see their undersides). There are two more applications to go for all the remaining doors. Unfortunately it’s starting to get cold and windy, which means i’ll be spraying outside then quickly bringing them inside to dry for the last two rounds.

November 28: On Friday, the weather was clear and a warm 48 degrees so I took off work and sprayed the remaining cabinets that need a second coat. Unfortunately, my previous spraying technique resulted in highly annoying and ugly drips of paint that dried in small mounds on the edge of some doors. I was not a happy camper. To remove the dried paint bumps, we had to sand, sand, sand down the drips (huge shout out to my friend Elizabeth who helped with 2 hours of sanding on Thursday night!).

For this 5th round of spraying, I implemented a new technique where I sprayed 6 doors at one time (the max amount that would fit on the saw horses), then quickly used a foam brush to gently wipe the side edges of each door to remove any excess paint. Then we walked the doors inside our house and laid them out on long pieces of wood to dry overnight. This technique worked SO much better and the next day we happily discovered no cursed paint drips to sand off. Allowing them to dry inside helped avoid small pieces of grass, leaves and other natural debris from landing on the cabinets.

Friday December 7: Realizing we had less than a week left to finish the last round of painting and allow for adequate dry time, I did the last coat on Friday before leaving for a weekend away. This time I was HYPER efficient and whipped through all the doors as fast as I could. Unfortunately it was freeeeeeeezing cold and my fingers turned bright pink, but I survived and so did the doors! Huzzah!

Now that I am finally done with this gargantuan effort, I simply CAN NOT WAIT for them to be installed this week! We hired a company to install our kitchen for us because we aren’t completely insane and realized we needed help. After this painting saga, I’m not even sure if I like this color any more, but once they are installed I’m sure I will love them in all their glory!

Tips for anyone thinking about spray painting your kitchen cabinets:

Benjamin Moore Advance paint is designed for kitchen cabinets, but you need to wait a looooooong time for it to fully dry before touching or moving it. I would recommend a full 24 hours at least–during this time do not stack the doors or allow them to touch each other.
Try to set up 2X4s or something else for the doors to sit on as you paint and do NOT move them after they’ve been painted. We didn’t have this luxury but it would be best to keep them where they are after spraying to avoid touching the wet paint. I also noticed after I moved the doors away from the spraying area and onto a drying area that sometimes paint had dripped to the bottom where I couldn’t see it and then dried in and stuck to the surface on which it was drying (which brings me to my next point).
Remove any excess paint from the edges of your doors immediately after spraying with a foam brush. This will avoid paint from pooling and drying in bumps along the edge of your cabinets.
Spray paint in a garage or covered space if possible–little pieces of grass, leaves, and general nature debris would blow into my yard and get on the doors as they dried. I wish we had a covered place to spray paint but unfortunately we don’t.
Do your cabinet painting in the spring or fall! It was probably too cold to do it in November and December, but we had not choice. Paint drys better when the temp is above 50 degrees.
Think about where you will put your doors to dry and after they are dry to wait before installation. We moved these heavy doors around almost every room of our house two times during the last month during different phases of the entire home’s renovation, which was not fun (especially the long pieces).

Would I do this again? Not sure–it was a TON of work and I couldn’t spend that time on other renovation activities. Paying a professional would have cost a lot more but the finished product would presumably have fewer imperfections. Am I happy with the outcome? Yes, I’m feeling very accomplished and trying to embrace the small imperfections. Hopefully only I will notice them so please don’t point out any blemishes on my cabinets when you come to visit!