Where do I start?? I love your colorful, cheerful, fun laundry!! I could never have envisioned those tiles laid. and painting the cabinets just made a night and day difference. Then you went above and beyond with the wall treatment--love it!! Beautiful house, beautiful boys! Must also comment on your finger. Was it diagnosed as arthritis or is that just an assumption? I ask because it sounds like my middle finger. I developed a "trigger finger" after a project that required much repetitive motion. If so, it is treatable. Thinking of you and your little one and will be watching for more pics of your projects! Liz

i might be able to help with my experience. I am not a painter. I am currently painting my cabs with the waterborne Benjamin Moore right now. My Benjamin moore store told me that oil based paint is not necessary anymore today with the quality of latex paints available today. I can tell you that the cabinets in the rest of my house were painted with benjamin moore impervo over 12 years ago, and they are still beautiful. I can also tell you that the finish is smoother and prettier than the new cabinets in my kitchen that I have used the waterborne paint on. And, I am or I believe that i am doing a really good job so far. I primed, sanded, painted first coat, sanded, painted on second coat. don't get me wrong, they look good, but the ones done 12 years ago just have a smoother finish. do not think that it will be easy to put latex over oil later. its not easy or simple at all. you will need to stip the oil paint off first. Or, i have heard that you can sand to roughen the oil paint up a bit and then apply an oil based primer and then you can paint with latex over that. but, I have never done this before. as far as my 12 year old oil painted cabs yellowing, they problably did a bit, but to me they just look like a creamy white. If they have, i don't mind it.

Kalona, Iowa, has a lot of them on each barn along the highway. I agree...the barns look better with the quilts when they are painted. They are fun to watch for...some of them have a quilt on the front "and" on the back. We have two wonderful barns on each side of our house...I've considered putting up barn quilts myself, but have never done it. There was a display of barns at our local museum a year or so ago and our barns were featured...they are old dairy barns...no longer used for that though.

I'm so sorry you're going through this! I've been through my share of nightmare projects, too. New houses are NOT immune from warped wood, out of plumb/out of square construction, or any of the other problems generally associated with older homes. Modern wood used for studs and joists (especially that found in big box stores) is often still "wet", or contains moister/sap that will react to different temperatures and humidities. The cut of the wood (cut to get the maximum amount of lumber out of a tree) will often lend itself to warping, cupping and twisting, putting everything down the line out of whack, including your tile. I'm afraid you won't be happy with the results of them patching together the tiles that were left. If it were my project, I would have them take it back to the studs and true everything up the right way before tiling. I'd also have them re-tile the whole thing on their dime; but that all depends on what was in the contract and how good your GC is. Good luck and let us know how it all goes!