Weekend Project

We tackled a project this weekend that we have been talking about for far too long...putting river rock on one wall in our living room.  First Martin put up plywood and mesh.  Then on Friday we placed all the rock.

 I slathered each rock with grout and Martin held them in place.  It was a bit like doing a puzzle, making sure all the rocks fir snugly and also making sure that the various colors were evenly distributed.

 Today we filled in all the spaces with more grout.  What a tiring and tedious job!

 We were told NOT to use our fingers for smoothing the grout, but rather to use a tool.  I tried various tools, but using my fingers worked much better and was faster.  However, I ended up with very sore and raw fingers!

 Here is the (almost) finished product.  We still need to wash all the stones to remove any extra grout.  (The grout should be dry enough by tomorrow or Monday.)  As you can see, we still need to install the wood stove and chimney and the ugly door needs to be refinished.  Hopefully the stove will be installed sometime this next week, but the door will have to wait until the weather warms up so I can refinish it in the garage.