When I bought my house all of seven months ago, the previous owners were offering a flooring credit, which I didn’t take. I figured I’d just do the carpet in the den, tile in the laundry and refinish the hardwoods all myself. Boy was I naïve. When I priced carpet for the den I thought I could live with that price, then I found out how much it costs to have it installed (insert shocked face here.) Same went for tile, the labor is just insanely expensive.
The carpet in the laundry had years of water stains, pet odors, and God knows what else embedded in it’s pile (who puts carpet in a laundry room?!). The smell had become so bad that we had to institute a rule in the house: The laundry room door was to remain closed at all times, because the smell would spread to the entire house. Imagine the reaction of guests. “Fallon, your home is so cute……. OH. MY…. What’s that smell?! Did something die in here?” Yup, every time. So, I survived five months with that, shoot me an email and I’ll let you know where to send my medal. Unfortunately, I don’t have a picture of the offending carpet.
One weekend, I happened upon some tile on sale at Lowe’s, $0.58/sf. I was quite pleased with the price. I calculated the size of my room and determined I would need a mere 47 square feet. Pennies! The 13″x13″ tiles came in boxes of 15 for $9.99. I bought three boxes and 5 individuals for a grand total of somewhere in the $35 range. Not bad. I also purchased a tiling kit that had a float, some nippers, a bucket, sponge, tile spacers, etc. I think it was somewhere around $15-20. Mortar and grout were another $9.99 each. So, I spent a total of $70. Not bad for a new smell-free laundry room. Throw in the inevitable free lunch I was going to have to offer up to my poor friends who volunteered, and we’re looking at more like $90. Still, not bad, much better than the $300 I was quoted by a tile guy. My good friend Aaron owns a small construction company so he loaned me a tile saw, tile cracker, extra floats, a mixer (VERY IMPORTANT), etc. He gave me a quick run down of the misery that was about to ensue, gave me some pointers, and my wary volunteers and I went to work!
Being bound by my can-do attitude, a little naïve optimism and a tight budget, I went headfirst into tiling my teensy laundry room. First was the
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With networks such as TLC and HGTV shoving DIY projects down our throats every hour of every day, one may easily be swept into the apparent charm of it all: “We made this tiny bathroom a master suite in 2 days with $500!” Every time I hear such claims on TV I want to yell into the unresponsive appliance, “Deceit! Deceit!”
No one can get your home ready for the masses quite like a professional home stager, but we realize that the term itself, let alone the concept, is still relatively new to many Oklahomans. If your Realtor is not purchasing the time of a
Jennifer Hicks is a Certified Interior Designer and Owner of
Our back yard is one of our favorite places, and our pergola is just one of the many things that help it feel like an extra living space. In fact, pergolas may be one of the things I suggest most often to my clients who’ve just bought a house that really has no flair outdoors.





