Posts Tagged With: Slate tile

The Completed DIY Network Project and Last Visit with The BarnWood Builders

Posted on September 1, 2015 by jolynnpowers

So today I think I am a little sad, the project is complete and the Barnwood Builders on the DIY Network have driven off to another barn or cabin. The Barnwood Builders shared something with me and my family that I can not easily explain, it is a gift, of course, a new family room, but it is something more also. It is when kindred spirits come together things get magical and create something better than if we were doing things alone. My family room would not have been half as beautiful without the lumber that we received from that old barn. Their show needed a willing and able family to take truckloads of old lumber and make it into something. My blog would have never gotten the recognition it has without them finding me in cyberspace. I would have never learned so much about the way TV production works and is filmed. Mark would have never put a shoe on a horse if it was not for people who deep down love West Virginia and the beautiful life this state has given us.

“MY” Barn in the Valley at Kenchelo road, Jane Lew,West Virginia

I have never in my life worked with a better group of people, the respect that is given to each person on the set from the littlest, ( Christopher) to the Assistants, Caterers, the barn or cabin owners, to Tom, I and the real stars of the show, is higher and deeper I have ever seen. The amount of teamwork these people have to put into creating a one hour show is hard to explain and they do it day in and day out.

Barnwood Builders promotional photo. right to left is Tim, Sherman, Bryan, Mark,Johnny, Graham

It took almost three days to film the demo of my old barn and Tom’s farrier segment. It took three more days to film my house and cut in clips of landscapes and animals. Then 4 or 5 weeks of planning and travel ( We joined the bandwagon a month before shooting started). Now 6 weeks to edit this one show and do voice-overs and graphics before this show will air. All for a one hour on the DIY network. What an amazing experience, I am still in disbelieve that It all happened … it was a dream, right?

Travis director of photography setting up on last day of filming

Travis director of photography with his assistant (back to you)setting up on last day of filming

I am a fan of Mark Bowe for his love of this State, its people and its rich history. It is his vision that I share and will continue to pour into my blog. So that maybe one day people outside our hollers will see that we are not trapped in the past or unlucky. That we have made a choice to slow our lives to remember our past and see the beauty that is our countries rich history. Without our past we have no future and it takes time to build a solid foundation to live on. ( Notice: West Virginia was barely impacted with the housing crisis or the recession that followed something to think about as most states finances are in the red while West Virginia is financially stable.)

Mark Bowe hanging in the living room after shooting with the Barnwood builders

On the last day of filming our house Sean McCourt (the executive producer), Travis (head photographer) and his assistant arrived about an hour before Mark Bow to set up the lights to make the room bright and homey. Well, nothing ever goes as planned and the lights that Sean rented were really no help for us and Travis worked hard to get as much natural light in the room as possible. I still think you will see in the final cut that the room looks dark …… like well the inside of a barn… kinda hard to get past that.

Christopher look out on the light bounce screen

Christopher looking out on the light bounce screen

Mark was happy to hear all the stories of our home in a way that I have not seen in any other episode. I have no idea what ones will be in the show but I am pretty sure you will see my artwork, the Mason jar Chandelier ( how we made it here), Toms Elk and lots of neat things we took from the barn to decorate with. Travis even took closes ups of my family photos and bearskin rug. It is strange to tell my family stories in front of a camera, the tail of packing out our Elk and getting it mounted by an oral surgeon, not a taxidermist, the print that my brother made from of a lake a block from my mother’s house in Longmont, Co. and the story of Toms grandfathers 28 point buck. Those are the pieces of my family that I just shared with America and the world… A strange feeling really!

The show works unscripted and is very open to the nature of the people and places they are working with. The weather and moods of the cast and”guests” are more real than you can imagine. The producers gave me a general overview of what they wanted us to cover in the show… new floors, walls, the DIY chandelier, and my artwork. Then turned to Mark and said, “We will shoot this in reverse order and will shoot from this doorway”. That is all the direction we got… seriously I just followed along…. if he asked a question or pointed anything out I just told the story that I have been telling everyone for the last 5 months. Then we moved outside for the “Greeting” portion of the shoot… yea a little strange but this made it easier for the lighting set up and is the only acting my family did… Christopher was a ham and Tom was nervous and I thought it was all funny. We had to film the greeting three times over to get all the information into the shot that Sean needed us to say or to keep hammy Christopher from blowing the high-five that he gives Mark.

Then they filmed Mark giving us our gift and I get to finally see the photo present they made for me. For a photography nut this was the very best gift I could have been given. I know the story behind the photo, the location, and the photographer and am so happy they got some blue sky in the photo. All I remember about that morning was cold and rain… It now looks lovely in my country kitchen and will be a treasured gift for the rest of my life.

Photo of my barn portrait gift from Mark Bowe

Barn wood about finished on wall with windows

Just like these treasured photos of the work we did and the time we spent together to make this all happen. It has been worth every moment of rain and mud, every long day of hanging wood boards in a 90-degree family room and hours of time on our knees with tile and grout. I think Tom, Cody and I logged 70 hours on the floor twice that of the walls.

drying slate tiles

Cody Powers stripping old floor tiles

Before barn wood and tile on the floor

Somehow it all came together and is better than anything I could have imagined. We now have a family room my family is proud of! Thank you to the cast and crew of the Barnwood Builders. I can’t wait to see episode# 5 of the new season that starts Oct 2015. I may just have a Viewing Party with my family and friends in November when my show airs… Who’s up for popcorn?

The finished family room from the laundry room with our cat Jinn.

Categories: Barnwood, Barnwood Builders, Buckhannon West Virginia, family memories, Home Decor, home improvement, Mason Jars, slate tile | Tags: Barns, Barnwood Builders, DIY network, family room, home remodeling, Mark Bowe, Mason Jars, Slate tile, West Virginia | 12 Comments

Baby Squires Interrupt a Day of Barn Wood Building: Home remodel #3

Posted on May 26, 2015 by jolynnpowers

We have been working like mad to finish up the floors and get a good start on the barn wood walls that are part of a remodel that we are doing with the T.V. Show titled “The Barnwood Builders.” Then all of our work just slowed to a stop on Monday. As Tom and I removed some of the larger boards from the lumber pile to see if we could find one that was wider then our fuse box door, we came across a nest built-in our barn wood. The babies are Gray Squirrels that normally would nest in a hard wood tree. It seems the mother felt that our huge pile of wood was a safe place to raise her young. She made a beautiful and warm nest out of the large amounts of green grass that is growing under the lumber piles. The little guys never even opened an eye while we banged around. Tom and I had no idea that they were sleeping under where we worked. By that afternoon we named the little ones and had a conversation about moving them in the house ( my vote was”NO”to squirrels in the house ) so here are Chipper and Splinter. The fearless squirrels that slowed the entire construction of my family room for a day.

Opening up the nest in the barn wood

Two baby gray squirrels in the nest sleep through all of our activity

meet Chipper and Splinter the Barnwood builder Babies

Meet Chipper and Splinter the Barnwood Babies

Tom and I just did not have the heart to really move the little guys even though they are resting on the very board that we need to make a door out of. So we are working on another portion of the family room for now. I hope within the next two weeks they will be ready to head into the trees with their Mom, we see her regularly going in and out of the nest.

As of Friday I had finished grouting the tile floors and sealed them. They turned out really nice with a muted color pattern of gray, sand stone red, gold and rusty orange. The same basic colors in our barn wood. I spent about 30 hours of time putting in the grout and cleaning it back off. It was a long week of feeling like Cinderella scrubbing floors on my hands and knees but the results are wonderful. The one trick I did learn over my week of scrubbing is that it saves you large amounts of time to seal the slate before you install it or grout it. The extra couple of hours I spent washing the tile and sealing it meant that I could trust that the grout would not stick to the slate when I put them together. So I could actually sweep most of the extra grout off with a broom. Making the cleaning up of the floor go extremely fast with one good washing getting all the extra grout off with no residue to worry about.

After using a grout bag I am able to sweep up a lot of the lose grout before washing

After using a grout bag I am able to sweep up a lot of the loose grout before washing

Slate tile floors with grout and sealer

We also got almost half the wall boards up over the holiday weekend, even with the squirrel delay. Tom and I decided that we both really wanted a room with a barn feeling, so we chose to keep the boards running in the vertical pattern as they were hung on the old barn. It gives the room the feeling of a general store or cabin from the old west that we both love.

Barn wood about finished on wall with windows

This photo shows a late afternoon sun shining on the walls so the floor colors appear shadowed and darker than they really are. The wood on the other hand is really that bold and different in color. We chose not to plain the wood and only lightly sand the rough finish off the boards. We are trying to give the room a true rustic barn feel and I think we really are getting that feeling so far.

The work is going faster than I though, mainly because we are using an Air Nail Gun to attach the boards to the walls. The nails we are using are 2 1/2 inches long and we nail the board at the top of the walls frame and then at any stud that we can find and at the bottom frame of the wall. Some of the boards are very warped and need cut to straighten them for use and others are fine off the wood pile. So each piece is an individual in a larger puzzle. We have chosen to keep the imperfections and natural coloring because that is what people really do when building a barn. You don’t toss out a good board due to a knothole or split in the grain, you just use it and move on, so we have saved and used the knots and splits as part of our over all design plan. Not every one is comfortable with the imperfections of the barn wood like we are, but this application is simple and less time-consuming then other wood treatments.

The remaining walls should be pretty easy to cover up until Tom needs to cover the fuse box. He will need to make a door with country hinges and an old fashion lock for decoration. Then 4 inch molding will go across the base of the wall and 2 inch molding around the top. Again this will be nothing fancy just simple cut boards and nails to finish off the look.

So if you want to read more about how we got the boards for this project or have interest in reclaiming barn wood check out some of my other posts about working with The Barnwood Builder TV show and Our House Remodel #2

In the future I hope I am able to post more photos of the family room and our new little friends I just wonder if I can get more photos of them before they leave the nest forever? We will see!

Categories: Baby Animals, Barns, Barnwood Builders, hobbies, Home Decor, home improvement, home remodeling, nostalgic, slate tile, Squirrles | Tags: Baby animals. Squirrels, barn wood, Barns, Barnwood Builders, family room, Gray Squirrels, grout, Home Decor, home remodeling, nostalgic, reclaimed wood, Slate tile | 4 Comments

Slate Tile Floor and Ceiling Work Almost Finished

Posted on May 5, 2015 by jolynnpowers

The floor is almost finished, yahoo! If you have been following along you already know about our remodel and the adventure we are having working with the Barnwood Builders and their TV show. If not take a look at where this mess all started and here is the idea we have for the future. The slate tile floor is about finished and the repaired ceiling is looking better than ever. It has taken about a month of weekends to get this far and we need about two more real good days to finish up the last couple boxes of tile and get about 10 cut and set in the hard to reach areas. Then grout will be the final step. I am not looking forward to spending 8 hours on my hands and knees trying to get grout to set up in between all this tile.

Family room floor with slate tile in place

Slate tile missing from entry area and stairwell

One of the unexpected things we have learned is that you need a tile saw, even if you do not buy one and only rent one they are wonderful and save you hours of work and worry when dealing with slate. Slate is layers and layers of sediment pressed together over thousands of years making it flaky and brittle and it is not as stable as ceramic tile. We tried several ways to cut the tile before finding that with delicate stone a tile saw saves you hours of headaches. Tom and I bought this portable one from E-Bay. This is what the company does best, selling used equipment that is still in great shape but not new! Tom and I found this same saw at Home Depot listed for $ 235.00 we bought this used one that was complete in the box with all the paper work and blade for $ 106.00 including shipping. We will use the saw at least 10 times this coming week and again when we redo our bathroom and kitchen making this a wise 100 dollar investment. Tom just set the saw on a piece of plywood over two saw horses as our work area. As shown the saw did a wonderful job of cutting a hard to fit piece of tile for the cross over between the family room and entry areas.

Used tile saw

Then while Tom was at work my oldest son Cody came over to help with finishing up the mud and tape that we added to the old ceiling. The old ceiling looked like this and was in rough shape. The 4 x 4 trim across the ceiling was loose and pulling away from the drywall in places and the lag bolts that you see are not hooked to anything and are not holding the ceiling up. The trim around the room was 2 x 2’s and did not fit well at the corners. All the trim just needed removed and the ceiling just needed a traditional finish.

ceiling was decorated with 4x4's and 2x2's and lag bolts.

ceiling with 4×4’s and 2×2’s and lag bolts.

So in the process of removing all of this from the ceiling we also removed a sheet of paneling from one wall. The paneling made the wall surface uneven and lumpy. It was white so you would not have noticed it until the barn wood was up and the boards were uneven. So here is what we found under the paneling.

Paneling removed and ceiling exposed

For a couple of days Cody and I worked on taping the ceiling, sanding and painting. The amount of glue you see on the wall is not bad so the paneling came down without ripping any huge holes in the walls. We did fill in some nail holes but over all the wall would just be painted white again and covered with barn wood to give it a uniform appearance.

Cody Powers doing mud and tap repairs to the ceiling

Then a fun photo of Christopher and I after sanding the ceiling and getting ready for paint.

Christopher and I after sanding the tape on the ceiling.

The with two coats of paint on the wall and ceiling we are only left with removing the single board that holds my light fixture/fan up. This board has my only light source attached to it so I am guessing that it will be in place for a long time.

Ceiling repair finished for now and wall painted white

Tom and I are so happy with the over all appearance of the floor that I am sure we will be doing this flooring in the kitchen in the future. It may take a little more time then rolling out linoleum but the results will last a life time and are so much nicer in quality. I just can’t wait to see it polished.

In the next couple of days I will likely be moaning that my hands and knees hurt from crawling around getting the grout cleaned off and the floors polished. I will complain that my mother’s day is at a restaurant instead of at our house because the kids can not play on wet grout. I will fall in to bed that night knowing I have just created not only a lovely home but wonderful memories for my kids.

Categories: Barnwood Builders, Home, Home Decor, home improvement, Memories, Mothers Day, slate tile | Tags: Barnwood Builders, Home Decor, home remodleing, Mother's Day, Slate tile | 9 Comments

Out with Old in with the New, Slate floors.

Posted on April 17, 2015 by jolynnpowers

As part of the barn wood remodel on our family room Tom and I decided that it was best to also replace the flooring in the family room before adding the barn wood to the walls. The wood is thick, 1 inch thick, making the boards stick way out away from our drywall, so changing the flooring after the wood is hung is a little more challenging than doing the floor first and setting the wood on top. So we agreed that gray barn wood would look great with slate tile. Barn wood and slate tile have unpredictable texture and color variations that makes them work well together. The natural feel of both the wood and stone with my leather furniture should give the room a rustic feel that we hope to slowly bring into the entire house.

So to achieve the new look we took out the old flooring. The house came with a white Berber carpet at one end and a rolled linoleum at the other.It took a whole day to remove the old tile and carpet and the hundreds of staples and nails that were in the old flooring.

Family room carpet end

Cody Power stripping old floor tiles

After a much-needed rest Tom began to install the cement board that would be the base for the tile. It is a water-resistant and mold guard product used for bathrooms, kitchens and in this case sticky floors.

Tom installing cement hardy board

The Hardy Board comes in sheets like plywood but much heavier. Each board is a cement fiber mixture to make it stiff, hard and water-resistant. I could barely lift one board at a time. Tom guesses each board weighs about 25 pounds and is 5 feet long making moving them very inconvenient. So keep in mind that you will not want to move them once you have them home. Mine took up a large portion of my kitchen floor for the two weeks we had to wait for the tile to arrive.

Remodeling supplies hard board, mortar, screws

Then finally the tile arrived, all 30 boxes and I got to unload it alone. Where do you store them I thought as I drove home from Lowe’s…. In the kitchen with everything else, of course. We are still cooking in the kitchen but eating is getting a little hard at our small 4 person table.

Tile boxes stored in the kitchen behind my french doors

The next thing was to prepare the tile for installation. Slate is a natural stone product and not factory made so it has some funny characteristics.Each tile is different in color, texture and thickness. Some will be close to matching but almost nothing is really the same. When you first open a box you discover the slate is brittle and flaky and the boxes are full of chips of stone and are very dirty from the cutting process. So dirty that you hands will change color in a matter of minutes while handling the tile. So before sealing the tile, to prevent staining to the tile in the future, I washed everyone in the sink with a scrubby to remove any loose flakes and dirt. That is about 300 tiles and about two full afternoons.

slate tile getting a good washing in sink before adding sealer

The water really brings out the wonderful colors in the tile and we can glaze the tile after installation if we decide that we want a shiny tile surface. I let the tile dry for about 2 hours and applied the liquid pre-grout sealer. I let the tiles dry for 4 more hours and Tom installed them on the floor.

drying slate tiles

He started last night with getting his center of the room measurements and his chalk lines on the floor and setting the corner stones for the floor. Now he will work back to these tiles and fill in around them as time at night allows. We are hoping to have the floor finished this weekend or next and the wood for the walls started by the first week-end in May.The final touches should be finished by the end of June, mostly light fixtures that Tom and I hope to make for this room. One will be a multiple colored mason jar chandelier and a wall mounted fixture that we need desperately over by the computer desk that I hope to also convert to a mason jar globe.

Corner slate tiles set and ready to fill in

This is so far my favorite of all projects we have done as a family and I am looking forward to doing more tile in my kitchen. The colors are wonderful and I am so happy with the speed that we are moving forward. I know we still have a lot of work to do, but if all goes this well,I see a slate floor in my kitchen very soon.

I will post a more photos when all the tiles are down and we get the furniture back into this room. I also think I will use some of the broken tiles to make a mosaic top for the old coffee table we had in this room at some point over the summer. We should have enough broken pieces(one whole box is either chipped or damaged already) and I should have some mortar left over from the floor so it will only cost me some time to make. So in the future I will have two posts about how we are making a mason jar chandler and one on a mosaic tile top for an old table.

I cant wait to see what this room looks like with one cohesive floor and wall covering. Over the years the room was divided and I want to feel that the kitchen and family room are large open rooms that connect in style and function. So “Out with the Old and In with the New” in a couple of summers the house we envision should really start to come together.