I remember the satisfaction of tiling a small area of porch in my Newcastle house. I didn't remember, until last night, how much stress it can be. Last night I really worked - except for the hour or so when I went out for something to eat.

Here's a pictorial account of the day.

5pm
The bathroom floor looks like this:



I do a general hoover up, then a sweep up and some more hoover up. Then I cut the matting to fit the space. I cut it as three "tiles". I also cut some cardboard templates for the notching required for the pipes. Then I mixed some tile adhesive - it barely covered an 1/8th of the floor area. It sets in 30 minutes. I'm panicking, so I went and mixed a load more. I put down the first mat, then the second. Mixed even more adhesive (this was going to be an issue) and then the third bit of mat went down.

7.17pm
The floor looks like this:



I go out for something to eat, then I come home, do some paperwork and start planning the tiling. I even play with my tile cutters to see how well they'll work for the job. I wasted one tile this way.

9.17pm
The first lot of adhesive has set and it's now safer to spend time on the floor. I lay all the tiles out with spacers, in the planned configuration, and start to cut.

11.40pm
Now I'm tired, and it's time to lay the tiles.

I lay and lay. Working at a pace. I run out of tile adhesive, so the last six tiles (in the doorway) won't get stuck down tonight.

1am-ish
I'm pretty much done. I start to wash my bucket and tools - they'll set hard otherwise. The floor is now like this:



By the time I've gone out for a shower and returned to bed, it's nearly 3am.