NEW COUNTERTOP PROJECT

Well, the rest of the summer has been flying by and has continued to be very good.  We did get a couple of weeks of smoky skies but not so bad that it stopped us from recreating as usual.

In the middle of August, we went to the Lower Mainland to visit family.  We were able to meet our great granddaughter for the first time and celebrate our twin grandsons’ 11^th birthday.  A busy time that even included a project for Stuart who installed a new kitchen faucet for his sister.

At home, we did a small project in our ensuite bathroom.  The countertop is made out of concrete and the seal coat on the surface was wearing off in places.  Since we wanted to change the colour from a light yellow to something darker and more dramatic, we decided to refinish the countertop with a product from the hardware store.  It wasn’t a big cost so if we didn’t like it, we could replace the whole countertop at a future time.

We started the project by removing a row of small tiles that formed the backsplash and that didn’t go very well.  The tiles would not peel off the drywall and we ended with holes in the wall.  If we’d known how stuck they would be, we would have cut them out with straight edges so the drywall fixes would have been easier.  We got it done, though, just a bit more work.

Stuart built a backsplash out of MDF and secured it over the repaired drywall.  The plan was to finish the backsplash with the same product as the countertop.

The refinishing process was 3 steps.  After removing the sink and faucet, Stuart sanded off the old sealer.

Then he applied 2 coats of a primer that had a slightly rough finish. 

After a fairly short drying time for the primer, he applied the colour/rock coat that went on very thick.  He chose to do 3 coats of that mix as we had plenty of product to use.  After it was dry, he sanded it down to reveal the rock like chips in the mix that gives the surface a look similar to granite.

Once it was looking the way we wanted, he applied two coats of clear epoxy to finish the job.  I painted the walls around the work area and we put the sink and faucet back in.  Overall, the job took about 3 days and we are happy with the results.

The garden is still producing cucumbers and beans, the tomatoes are coming on strong along with the sweet and hot peppers.  We had our first cabbage a few weeks ago and are looking forward to the melons being ripe in a few weeks.  Hope we don’t get an early frost!!