I Want Tile!

Tessie doesn't like the tin sheet that goes under the wood stove. She kept witching it out and I kept putting it back in. I explained that she would burn the cottage down if she didn't have something fireproof under there. Thus the title.

It seems that she has been through my whole workroom and knows what's there better than I do. She dug out some turn of the century tile that I had scanned from one of my Dover books. I had forgotten that I did it. She didn't. I used some in her glass cage. Evidently she liked that part of the case a lot.

She then suggested that I show you how to make the paper look like tile. OK. Here goes. It is really simple to do. I used a print out, but you can do it with any kind of geometric pattern for a floor and I did it for the panel on the fountain in my birdcage.

I cut the tile to the size that I wanted under the the stove. In the case of the one that I did, I had to cut and patch one edge of the border. I simply took a strip of the border and put it down the third side and cut a 45°angle. Then I put another strip of the border and slid it along until the corner matched. I glued both pieces to a piece of Crescent illustration board and cut that out to the size of the tile.

Next, I took a stylus and a metal ruler and pressed in lines where the grout lines are. Press hard but don't tear the paper!

I then painted the edges all around with the trail tan paint that you see in the photo. It is pretty close to the color of real tile. After that dried I took one of the big fat emery boards. You know they're the ones that come in bright colors for about a dollar just about anywhere. They are much finer than regular emery boards and work well on the softer materials. When you sand off the top edges it makes the piece look more like tile. Usually there is a lighter edge where the glaze meets the tile itself.

The last step was to take a pencil and mark the grout lines on the edges. I will glaze the tile with the same acrylic varnish that I use on the floor. If you want thinner tile you can use poster board in place of the illustration board. I prefer the illustration board for floors because It is not apt to warp like the poster board will.

Now then........The only problem that I have left for the day is Tessie herself. She worked on me until I agreed to give her the stove. I am still not letting her eat the cake and cookies that Val sent me. They are too pretty to be eaten. She kept the chocolate chip cookies. Friskie loves it when Tessie cooks. She is very messy and he gets a lot of the stuff that she drops. Good Eats!

I am a little worried. She wants the stove hooked up for cooking "Right Now!". She found my favorite wok pan and Japanese cleaver..... I'm afraid to ask what she is going to cook with that. She might just tell me.......I don't think that I want to know!

See you tomorrow.