Home Project: Day 6

After our late night on Friday and a cold and uncomfortable night on the air mattress, team Clawson was a little reluctant to get a start on the day. It was apparent that our goal of mudding and laying all the backerboard by noon and starting in on the tile that afternoon was unrealistic (ok insane). I dropped Kennedy off at the Dalebout's for the day (thank you thank you thank you) and stopped off to teach a quick piano lesson while Tim cut the last few pieces of backerboard.
When I got to the house I set about leveling the front entry way and a few other areas with mortar that we needed to harden before applying another coat of mortar and the backerboard on top.
From this point on the details get a little hazy and I have no idea at what point we were actually ready to lay the mortar and backerboard. I recall dimly needing additonal supplies and a trip to Lowes in the pouring rain. The Jensens brought us Subway at some point (thank you). Tim ran to another hardware store for screws to tighten the sub floor and stop creaks. More rain and cold. Then random sun. I made a trip to 7 eleven for chap stick and ice cream bars.
Then came the laying of the backerboard. I estimate this started around 3 pm, but that could be totally wrong. We kicked things off by mixing way too much of the mortar at one time so I was forced to keep going forever with no breaks. (Thin-set only stays usable for so long. Good to know) My job was to lay the mud and locate the piece of backerboard to cover it. Then Tim would help me lay it in place. After it was down, Tim set to fastening it to the subfloor with a ridiculous number of screws. I swear each board needed 30 screws each. Tim calculated that he used around 1500 screws that long long night.
So along we went mudding and screw driving long into the night. Around 7 Tim picked up Kennedy from the Dalebout's (again thank you thank you thank out) and took her to the Dunnigans. While he was gone I attempted to lay a piece of backerboard on my own and nearly killed myself. The most frustrating thing was that we forgot to mark where each piece went when we picked them up so it was like doing a giant heavy jigsaw puzzle while watching your step for wet mortar patches and already laid backerboard. I may never do a puzzle again.
The Dunnigans dropped Kennedy off (thanks million to you guys too) and checked in on our progress. At this point we had about 3/4 of the floor laid and the question was do we call it a night or do we push on until it's done. Call us crazy, but we put the K to sleep, cranked up the tunes, and laid stupid backer board until 3 in the morning. Tim stayed up and additional two hours completing all the screws. Whew! Just thinking about it makes me tired.
We wisely decided to crash on the airbed again that night as driving in our condition was hazardous to both us and those on the roads at that unholy hour. So we woke up Mother's Day dragged our aching bodies out the door and went home to shower, sleep, go to church, and sleep some more. Thank goodness for a day of rest!

Laying the mortar. Oh my aching back!

Tim vs the screws

The finished puzzle!