Tuesday, March 29, 2011

how to put up a backsplash and stay married

It seems it's easy to do home improvement projects in harmony as a couple. I watch A LOT of HGTV. I see the naive couples look at each other and say, "We can totally take down this wall and open up the kitchen!" Cut to the scene where the man is trying to hold up a wall with his back while the Sheetrock rains down on him, the woman holding a sledge hammer, shaking her head with a look of disdain. I'm proud to say that this weekend, that was NOT me and Mr. KK. Oh, we've had our share of - ahem - renovation fun. In fact, we're such big house nerds, that since we've lived in Boston we have "Home Improvement Fridays", which pretty much means that we stay in, order some food, and tackle a project. In our current house, many times that project was hanging something on the walls. Now, let me preface this by saying that once I paint a wall, I'm rather* selective as to what goes on it. Also, I hate putting holes in a fresh wall. Case in point: 75% of our second floor is bare walls. We've lived in the house for over 5 years. I have issues. *VERY Also, our house is old and has plaster walls (read: they crumble like feta the minute you tap them with a nail). Hanging something on plaster walls is maddening. I think that as a new form of punishment for crimes, felons should be told they have to hang 100 pictures on plaster walls, perfectly straight. We are renovating a house that it seems we will NEVER move into (separate blog post to discuss THAT ridiculousness). We're at the point when all of the big stuff is done, so we spend weekends filling in nail holes in the trim with plaster (with my small fingers, which haven't seen a manicure since DECEMBER), painting (and re-painting) the walls and...the back splash. It was back-breaking work, but for 6 hours on Saturday, we harmoniously created this:

3 comments:

Tasha said...

Wow! Your kitchen is beautiful! That backsplash is amazing and those countertops are incredible! I want! I want!

FunnyGal KAT said...

Gorgeous! The Pretend Husband and I have had all kind of experiences working on our house together-- good and bad. I need some details about what it was like to install the backsplash, as I am currently contemplating installing one in our kitchen. Easy? Hard? Any advice?

GlitterFactory said...

wow! gorgeous! i'm so impressed.