Progress on the fireplace

This past weekend my wife and I finally tiled our fireplace surround. It took 7 hours straight on Saturday to tile it and about the same on Sunday to grout it. My entire body is still aching from this back-breaking labor, and I still cannot clean the black grout stain off my skin and under my nails. Anyway, we used 1×2 mosaics for the top and bottom, and I cut 12×12 tiles down to 3×3 and 3×6 inch pieces to do the platform. For anyone interested, the platform was done in a “windmill” pattern and top and bottom would be considered an “alternating” pattern. We still have to give it one more good cleaning with a light acid wash and then seal it with a stone sealer.

We ordered the mantle cap on Monday, so hopefully we get it a couple weeks before Christmas. Once that is installed, we are going to prime it and the walls, paint, and put up the trim.