Tiling the Kitchen Floor

After Katie stripped up the linoleum from the kitchen floor, we borrowed a tile cutter, bought our trowel, grout and quick-set, and got to work putting down our tile. Tiling takes a lot of foresight as to how much tile you'll need, where you'll be cutting, and how the spacing will affect all of that. We opted to use 1/4" spacing and used charcoal sanded grout, to match the dark tiles as closely as possible. Dark gray grout is also much more forgiving with floors, because dirt doesn't show up too readily, as it does with white grout.

The first two rows, meeting the cabinet corner

There's a bit of wiggling to make sure that your lines are straight consistent. The quick-set (the white adhesive base that the tiles go down on) dries quickly, so there's not a whole lot of time to get it right.

4 rows...

 I tiled in a snaking pattern, right to left, then left to right, and so on. I think this helped to keep the spacing even, but who knows; might have been just as clean tiling every row right to left. We cut as we went, rather than cutting all the tiles ahead of time. Cutting ahead of time, you might find that the spacing isn't quite what you'd anticipated when you arrive at the edge that requires a cut; cutting as you go guarantees you'll be cutting at exactly the size you need, but again, you do have to move quick, because the quick-set will dry out on you.

last row...

We were lucky and only needed to cut one corner, which you'll see at the edge of the cabinet in the above picture. Tile cutting can be tricky, and it's easy to snap the tile and have the cut split along a grain rather than where you've scored it, so it's good practice to have extra tile. We lost a few tiles to bad cuts, but some of them could be salvaged where very small pieces were needed, as around the edge of the cabinets. Overall, it was easy enough and came together pretty quickly.

enjoying a beer after a job well done

Once tiling was finished, we had to wait a few days (and keep off the floor) before we could grout.

We neglected to take any pictures of the grouting process, but it's pretty simple: I mixed a big bucket of the grout, slopped it over the tile, and used a rubber trowel called a float to spread it into the gutters and mush it in as flat and even as possible. The process left a haze all over that beautiful new tile, but all the haze wipes off the next day. After the grout has had time to cure, we sealed the grout, and our kitchen floor was finally ready to use!

sealing the grout

All in all, our kitchen was out of commission for about a week, but it was worth the work and the wait. The tiles plus all required materials (grout, quick-set, float, spacers, trowel, etc) probably came to between $325-$350 for our 70-ish square foot kitchen; well worth it to upgrade from cringe-worthy linoleum to sleek tile. Most of the investment is the labor itself, which, if you plan it out right and are careful with your measurements, isn't all that bad. Tiling (cutting as we went) probably took around four hours, grouting less than two, and sealing the grout maybe twenty minutes of work time for two coats. That's with no previous experience laying tile. It was easy enough that we're looking forward to re-tiling our bathroom, which is all white with white grout, and thus gets dingy easily. We may use the same tile in the bathroom as well.

The old floors...

finished floors today