AnneX's Profile

If the grout is clean and not sealed, it can be stained uniformly and sealed in one application with a grout stain sold online at http://www.groutdye.com.
This company matches Mapei stain colors (see Lowe's for Mapei grout color charts.) Earlier this year, I re-stained the grout with their product on a 1,000 sqft tile floor. The tile color is light brown ... and the previous owners had grouted it nearly black! It was like living on top of a crossword puzzle grid .. unbearable. I got a close match to the much lighter tile color and am thrilled with the unifying result. If you go "white" ... the gaps wouldn't be so hard on the eyes.

In S. Florida, squirrels and roof rats, a/k/a Norway rats, are abundant in older neighborhoods with mature landscape. The rats are fairly easy to deal with ... we set out poison our village gives out gratis to homeowners. We hide the bait in boxes whose openings are too small for squirrels to enter. (I hate squirrels but not enough to poison them.) The squirrels we keep out of planters by sprinkling cayenne pepper on flowers and the soil. Lots of it. Costco sells large jars. For slugs, snails and other destructive crawly things, diatomaceous earth sprinkled liberally on the ground works very well. It's used as filter powder in swimming pool pumps, so it's definitely non-toxic. Home Depot and pool supply houses sell it. Some people say that it also works indoors on roaches, fleas etc.

Good luck, and here's hoping your squirrels sneeze themselves into permanent coma :)