Fireplace Update: An Ambitious Task

I have to be one of the worst people at judging how long a project is going to take me.  When I go to glaze all my bisque ware I estimate it that it will take me three to four hours tops and usually I will be eight hours in and almost half way done.  Even when I decided to take our small kitchen table and refinish it one summer.  Ben, unknowingly said that a new look for the table would be wonderful, especially since I told him it would be a weekend project, three days max.  And nine days later, our table was returned to the kitchen.  Thankfully, I chose to do that in the summer so we were able to use our patio table to eat on instead.

Original fireplace.

So this time, I suggested we change the facade of our fireplace in our new home.  Now when I say fireplace, I really mean the whole wall.  We bought our home in July and this was one thing that I was eager to get done.  I truly thought it would take about two weekends to complete.  Well, we started this project in mid-October and so very close to finishing it now. Part of the reason it took us so long is that we only have a few tools and had to rely on family to borrow the ones we needed to complete this project.  As first time home buyers we're still trying to furnish our house (we have several empty rooms and rooms that need more purposeful furniture) and really didn't think much about buying and collecting tools the last few years. So we had to wait a week or so before we were able to borrow and buy all the materials.  This is where a lot of my time has been spent when not working on school stuff.

Demolish to current state.

So as you can see, our fireplace was pretty as it came with the house, however, I just felt it could be better.  Ben believed me and trusted me with my vision.  It took about two weeks to get the entire thing built and painted.  Which looking back at it, hasn't been so bad, just messy in the house.  The last few things we have left are tiling the fireplace, adding doors to the bottom half of the bookcases and touching up just a few areas with paint.  Ben and I are still collecting tile samples.  My first vision was to use a medium sized subway tile that was a dark matte gray, but after searching high and low and the few tile samples I had delivered, we've declared that that isn't the best option. Our current tile consideration is a rectangular soft,white and gray swirled marble. My current goal is to complete this project before Thanksgiving, but as I look at my calendar I think we'll be completing it on Thanksgiving break.  I just can't wait to decorate it for the Holidays!

Hopefully I'll be able to show you completed pictures soon!

Happy dabbling!