Joni's condo kitchen remodel: Coming into the final stretch

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Joni's condo kitchen update is nearly done. (See the project up to now.) Joni's friend and fellow nurse Patti is helping out, and she files this report:

I'm home from the mountains and went to see Joni's kitchen today. It's beautiful! I am thrilled and so is she. (Click photos to enlarge.)

Joni opted to have a friend who is a "tile guy" finish the tiling. She helped him and said that our thin set was definitely too thin. He applied it the same as we did; it was just thicker. We'll never make that mistake again. The tile guy also did the grout work for her and had a tile saw to cut the few that required adjustments. I think she had just had it with the mess we had to clean up after using thin set that was too thin.

We are very close to being done. I think one day or so of clean-up just may do it. We need to finish some drywall work and put a finish coat of paint on the kitchen walls. And then we'll replace the switch plates.

Joni is already talking about how to carry the mood and color palette from the kitchen into the living room. I can't believe the balance that the chocolate-colored panels at the top of the cabinets (see that here) provides to the tile. I really don't know if it's just dumb luck or if there was some intuition at play in the color choice. However it came to us, I'll take it. It's beautiful.

We have one more issue to resolve: how to hang pendant lights from a solid beam over the breakfast bar. I'll be asking your advice in a future posting.