Picking Tile + Seeking a Quick Clean
There’s some wild creative energy flowing around here. It could be the spring weather (which is a mix of waking up to warm, peaceful mornings one day, then an inch or two of snow the next). It could be the growth of my journal shop. It could be the progress we’re making at the hangar or the facebook conversations going on. Or or or.
I think it’s all these things.
And all that creative energy that comes our way is immediately poured right into some exciting decisions. Like tile!
This subway tile is made in the United States. It feels very German, and it’s going to be crazy easy to clean in our bathroom and kitchen (just like we had in Germany!). We’re also going with some larger rectangles that we’ll stagger in the same layout.
A clean house definitely contributes to my idea of a comfortable home. The tire house where we’re living now is pretty much impossible to clean thanks to tire and stucco walls and rough wood trim and row of dirt + rocks. You actually have to vacuum the walls!
Cleaning it makes me really cranky. I don’t want to be a cranky person, so I’m pretty much obsessed with one question in the bathroom and kitchen:
How easy is it to clean that?
This dark chocolate tile is going on the bathroom floor. Grout is the hardest part to clean, I think. So the tiles are going to be a classy 18 inch squares (46 cm). The grout will be a deep mocha and super thin — like 3/32 inches (24 mm). Unglossy and dark. That’s my kind of bathroom floor. No one’s going to spot a few blond hairs or dust bunnies when I skip cleaning. I hope!
Of course, my biggest secret to a clean house is a small house. I just read that the average woman spends 54 minutes cleaning her house every day. What do you think? Accurate? No?
All I know is when I do spend 54 minutes cleaning, the transformation is going to be so much more measurable in our small, easy to clean house than the tire house. Or so I hope!
What are your thoughts on house cleaning? Love it? Hate it? Look for the lazy man’s route like me?
P.S. Thank you for all your travel journal purchases for spring break this year. Pack me away in your suitcase for an adventure?
Ah, I learned my lesson quickly with light colored grout. Our first bathroom redo had dark tan tiles with off white grout…never again! Next bathroom floor we replaced had dark tile with dark grout!
I love both a clean AND organized house. What happens to me most often is that I’m quick to declutter and organize, but actual cleaning comes later. I’m willing to tolerate some dust but not a dirty bathroom. I’ve learned to keep a satsh of basic supplies in the bathroom so I can do a quick 5 minute wipedown every few days.
i’m with Kim: i love to declutter and organize, but actual cleaning takes a little more effort to get myself started. for instance, even though we’ve got a bunch of family, friends, and neighbors dropping on on us this coming weekend for my daughter’s first birthday (wow!), i have yet to do any real cleaning. and the list of things to clean isn’t short: tile floors, carpeted floors, bathrooms, windows, shelves full of books and movies, and more!
i’ve said since the beginning of our house hunt, i want something small. but Hubby was obsessed with the open floorplan Florida-style homes. but hey, at least he’s sold on the fact that our next house should be small and easy to tidy!
What color will the grout be for the subway tile? Blue? Green? Red?
Maybe 54 minutes a week. But then again I don’t keep a very neat house… :-)
haha! Fun ideas, Rose. I guess we’re keeping über German; the grout with the white tiles will be… white.
ha! I love that, Katie.
Not a big fan of tile floors. Had them in our Texas house. Cold on the feet. Uneven texture made it hard to sweep so I ended up vacuuming them. I’d rather have wood floors or vinyl in the bathrooms and laundry areas and kitchen. Cleaning house– 10 minutes a day so maybe 50 minutes a week. It’s the laundry that takes longer for me. Thanks for sharing your progress on your new home with all of us.
THIS “biggest secret to a clean house is a small house.” is so true.
It’s why our house frustrates me with all its 1500 square feet. To many it would be “small” but to me it’s too large from a cleaning perspective!
That’s interesting, Andrea! In Germany, people don’t sweep their floors. They vacuum. I picked up the habit because it was so awesome for grabbing dust while my broom always seemed to just push it around.
So I guess you were just being German without knowing it. ;)
Thankfully, the radiant floor heating we’ll be installing will also eliminate that cold foot feel. I know what you’re saying! (shiver)
Katie
I don’t love or hate or house claaning. But I LOVE having a clean house so actually doing the cleaning is a necessary evil. My husband I have split up the cleaning chores between the two of us (including dishes and laundry) and we clean for about an hour three nights a week. So that would be six hours a week in total cleaning time.
On a related note, we have lots of tile in our house and we use a Bissell Sweep and Steam that is awesome. It sweeps/vacuums while steam mopping. LOVE it!
I think the brown tiles are a beautiful color! They will be great at hiding dirt. We have them in a sunroom, and I never realize how dirty they are from the children and dog coming back inside until I steam mop them once a week. The mop pad is always black..eww. As far as the tile pattern, the one you picked is also great for that. In the kitchen we have a cream tile with those textured lines very close together. It holds dirt and doesn’t look very nice, especially how fast then can get dirty with little ones helping out in the kitchen. A regular mop or even the steam mop can’t get into the cracks and crevices. Every few months we have a tile scrubbing “activity” and the kids grab sponges and brushes and love playing in the dish soap bubbles as they help get the tile looking like new. Hope that helps! :)
the house we moved into had just had the bathrooms renovated and the tile the owners picked didn’t seem like my “style.” but now i love it! they did dark gray on the floors and light gray on the walls. those things never look dirty! love it!
we too have a steam mop (shark) because the majority of our house is wood and tile. the steam mop makes cleaning so much easier.
Katie – Thank you so much for posting this tile pic! This is the perfect backsplash for my kitchen. I like it so much I had to make a trip to Lowe’s this weekend to make sure our Lowe’s had it and they do.
We have that tile in our shower/bathtub and it’s great. We probably even bought it at the same place–the Bozeman Lowes. We went with pebble tile on the floor, which is going to be tougher to keep clean, but oh how I love it!