Our Basement Part 30: The Striped Shower is Grouted!

Shower all Grouted!

So we got our hands a little dirty this weekend and grouted the shower! My hands are now totally dry and cracked to prove I have had a busy weekend. I have grouted before although this was my first time grouting with gray grout and on multiple surfaces. I was a little rusty and a few of the joints aren’t perfect, but overall I am very happy with the results. I am in love with the gray grout with the stone stripes! The gray grout really brought out their color of the marble.  This ended up taking up a good bit of time this weekend, but I am very relieved to have this part of the bathroom finished. It still needs a little bit of caulk around the bottom and side seams, but we are otherwise ready for final plumbing (not counting the floor in the bathroom).

The Making of a Shower!

Close up of Tile

I will spare you all the ins and outs of grouting, since it has been documented many times by professionals but time wise I ended up spending about 3 hours getting excess thin set mortar out of the joints. I haven’t had to do this step before but I think because the mortar ended up being thicker than normal to accommodate the stone accent tile, we ended up with a good bit that had to be taken out. After some trial and error, I ended up using a combination of a utility knife, screwdriver and wooden bbq skewer. Then after cleaning everything off again with a sponge I spent about 6 hours grouting and cleaning up (in 2 sessions). I am sure if you are a professional you could do it in about half that time, but alas I am not! I even had a little “helper” for part of the clean up.

Main Room partially whitewashed!

We also did some more whitewashing and Drew cleaned out one of the windows (which has had dead ivy in between the storm and window for longer than I would care to mention).

Was anyone else productive this weekend?

* To see all of the posts about our basement click here.