Our "New" Old Bathroom
A master bathroom refresh.
For our anniversary last summer my husband and I decided to give our master bedroom a make-over. It is beautiful and it feels so peaceful when you walk in. But that made our master bathroom look like an eyesore. And you know the book If You Give A Mouse A Cookie? Well one project leads to the next, at least in this house it does.
We (or I) would have liked to do a total gut job on this one, but we decided the funds for that needed to be spent elsewhere, like eating and stuff, so we just gave our old bathroom a refresh instead. We kept almost all the same basic features, the faucets, vanity, shower, toilet, flooring, and we only added new lighting.
You know how some projects just seem to come together? Your design looks great, and everything just works and it’s all smooth sailing? Well, at least as smooth as it can be. This was not one of those projects. I would describe this as a one step forward-two steps back kinda project. It involved a lot of doing, undoing, and re-doing. But it did turn out beautiful and it’s finished! (Well almost) And it was worth it all! It’s so pretty now. I just want to stare at it. I go into my bathroom just for the fun of it! (As much fun as you can have in a bathroom.)
So without further ado…here is our new to us bathroom!
To give you a reference of where we started from, here is a picture of our bathroom when we first saw our home. I don't have a picture of the other side of the room, but to the left of the vanity there is a single shower and that's about it. Not much to it!
We started by removing the vanity and building a base for it to raise it up a few inches. It was a little on the low side and since we are both tall"ish" and it would help us not to have to bend over so much to reach the sinks. My husband, being the carpenter, did a great job and it looked so pretty with the trim he attached. Except when we put it back in the bathroom, I felt like I needed a ladder to reach the counter top. So, being the sweet man he is, carried it back downstairs (again!!) and rebuilt the entire base to make me happy.
Then we moved onto the lights. We took down the two small light bars above the mirrors and added a single bar over where the new mirror would be. Except after we did all the drywalling and mudding, we discovered the new light was too low and it needed to be moved. So we had to move the light box higher, cutting a new hole in our freshly completed wall. Ugh!
Next we moved onto the walls. I painted the upper walls to prepare for the board and batten treatment that we were going to put up on the lower part of the walls. I liked a color that we had already painted another room in our home, but when I had the paint mixed up it came out waaaay too yellow. It was supposed to be a warm cream. This is the first color I painted...
So my now my dilemma was what to do? I could live with it and cry everyday I came in my bathroom or squint and pretend I liked it. I could get cleaned up, pack up the kids, and run 45 minutes to the store for more paint. Or I could make my own concoction of various colors of paint that I had on hand and pray I would like it. So that's what I did! And it turned out perfect! Here is the new paint color that I created...
Then it was on to the board and batten. Originally in the design of this room I wanted to put shiplap on the wall with the window, as an accent wall to match the one we did in our bedroom. But right after my sweet Carpenter cut all the boards, I changed my mind. So he had to re-cut them to fit our new design and it turned out beautifully! (And he was happy with the change in plans too!) Then it was just putting up the boards, cutting and re-cutting to make the fit, and hours and hours of caulking and painting.
We were in the final stretch now! We could see the light at the end of the tunnel. We just had to install everything again. We decided to remove the old shower door and put up a shower curtain, which I sewed from two long curtain panels.
And that's it. The rest was just the fun part of seeing beauty come from ashes. I still have some work to do to finish the decorations and the little stuff to pull it all together, but we made it! Our marriage survived a month or so without a bathroom while this project took a step forward and two steps back. Thank goodness for a little kindness through it all and giving each other the grace to be human! And now we love our bathroom and I find myself cleaning it every few days just to keep it pretty and sparkly. And here it is again in all its glory!
Thanks for following along with us on this master bedroom refresh! Let see what the next project brings!
