Sleep deprivation and the smell of thin-set in the morning

We have finally gotten around to tiling the floor in the bathroom. After a lot of shenanigans with respect to other projects distracting us and having a hard time deciding how to lay the tile out, we finally bit the bullet and started setting tiles at about 9:45 last night. The tile has a LOT of color variation and we like the darker tiles more than the lighter ones, but of course we ended up with more light ones than dark ones, making laying the course out very difficult. The grains in the stone and the patterns were so varied that it was very time consuming determining the best lay-out and creating a color gradient.

Here are some pictures of the practice lay-outs:


Unfortunately, I took a lot of time to make some very detailed cuts around the vent and toilet flange (and there's a long story to that as well entailing 3 tries, lots of PVC glue, quite a bit of cursing, and 3 trips to Home Depot). At about 2:25 am we ran out of mortar and we were left finishing where we were after vowing to not go to bed until it was done. It was a valiant effort but we came up short on mortar and energy. We'll have to finish it tonight, then grout in 2 days and seal it after that! WORK WORK WORK!

Here is the picture of the floor as it stands now next to how it was just before we started.


We've also had "fun with water" the past week or so. After finally fixing the "waterfall" in the basement that was causing water to collect around the base of the water heater and furnace (as shown in the pictures below) the water decided to come down harder than ever earlier this week and revealed 2 other sources of water flow to us, this time a crack in the foundation and the water continues to POUR out from underneath the basement entry door. We're going to have to do something about that as soon as the bathroom and laundry are done. Adding a second sump pump should help and re-grading the concrete in the landing at the bottom of the stairs won't hurt!


But wait, there's more! The other night during a particularly windy and violent storm we had water come through our living room ceiling! ARGH! When will it stop? This looks to be the result of some failed flashing along the edge of the siding and roof, but we're not 100% sure yet. I'll have to get a closer look at it this week when the weather is better, but it looks like this has happened before, so I have no idea what I may find underneath when I go looking...


We did take some time off to watch the Bears destroy Seattle Sunday night, though. Dusty looks pretty content with the game already in the bag by the end of the first half.