Home Is Where the Hearth Is

I’m now one step closer to having my fireplace fixed up. Just in time for warm weather! The last (foreseeable) step is to get new gas logs and have someone install them and replace the chimney cap or flue or whatever needs fixing. Plus I need to do some detail work: stain the wood molding around the new tiles and do some touch ups with paint. My folks recommended someone to call for the logs and chimney stuff, so that’s next on my to-do list. It’s still a lot to get done, but I feel I’ve accomplished so much now that the tile–at last–is in place.
Here’s close to where I started, except the walls were dirty white and cracked. This is just after I painted the walls Meadow Dusk or some such.

And here you can see the red brick, on the wall and floor. The color was so strong for such a small room, and I didn’t like how the wall and floor bricks were different reds.

And you can see where the previous owners got paint all over the brick. I tried everything to get it off, but it was on good.

When you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em. Here is the brick freshly painted. Eventually I painted the mirror trim the same color–you can see that in the next picture.

And here it is now, with the new travertine marble tile on the hearth. Ooooooh. I love.

Here’s a close up of the tile. Sooo pretty.

I highly recommend the man who installed the tile, Tim Frey. He also did my bathroom tile–wall and floor–and I was so amazed at how good it looked, especially since my old walls and floors are NOT square, not at all, and yet he made them look that way. I got the tile at Zumpano’s, and it turned out a lot cheaper than I thought it might after pricing at Lowe’s. Zumpano’s just has so many choices, I found a tile I loved for relatively cheap.
I have a few squares of tile left over, and I’m not sure what to do with them. If I had something to cut them with, they might make nice trivets or coasters. I guess they could be stepping stones for the chickens. Any ideas?