Bathroom Makeover

The bathroom redo is officially done!  

We are so blessed to have our home...but "blessed" is not often what came to my mind when we first purchased our current home.  Steve, the optimist, definitely saw more of it's potential than I did.  This is our 3rd house...we built our first two...yes, I was spoiled..very, very spoiled.  Thankfully, God has really worked in my heart concerning this house and how I look at a home...and this home has really grown on me.  I am so very thankful for the home He has provided and the things He has taught me.  This is a great home :)

...but a bigger upstairs bathroom would still be nice :) 

Anyhoo, our home was built in the 50's (I think the cool, HGTV term is "mid-century") and sometime in it's history, an addition was built on the back...the heavy use of dark wood paneling makes us suspect the addition was added in the 70's :)  (1973 to be exact, according to Steve...who remembers this tidbit of info from our mortgage documents.)  And with the addition, came a downstairs bathroom...which I soon learned is actually a pretty nice bonus for some of these older homes.

We painted the dark paneled rooms years ago...at least they are real wood and look pretty nice lightened up.  What a difference a coat (well, many coats actually) of paint makes!  

But the downstairs bathroom...what can I say...we affectionately called it Outhouse Chic.  The linoleum was this ugly river rock looking stuff...we named it Shiny Pebble.  It had dark paneling (the fake stuff) up to the chair rail, dark wood trim, a sink whose hot water handle came off every other time you used it, a doorknob that often came off in your hand (and sometimes made opening the door a bit tricky), and wallpaper that made me wonder why that pattern was ever even made.  As I peeled the paper off, Bella had a hard time telling the difference between where the wall was now bare with just the glue left behind and where the paper was still up...it was that bad.  And to complete the effect, we even had a wooden toilet seat!  The only thing missing was a moon cut into the bathroom door :)  It makes me laugh just to write about it! 


See...

Wooden medicine cabinet, dark paneling, shiny pebble floor...classy!

The previous owner used a napkin as a valance.  See that bit of wallpaper...it almost matches the glue pattern left behind where I already peeled some of the paper off the wall.  Oh, and there's part of the doorknob~

Wooden toilet seat...bonus!

But now, my friends, it's a completely different room.  First, I hired this really HOT handyman! Ooh, la, la!

The HOT handyman...putting in new flooring...bye-bye Shiny Pebble!.  Notice the broken doorknob~

HOTTIE!

Bye-bye old broken doorknob~

Steve put in new flooring.  He used a product called Allure; nice looking, easy to install, waterproof (important for a bathroom), and very affordable (important for our budget).  He removed the dark paneling and replaced it with beadboard.  I removed all the old wallpaper and the glue and we painted the room a nice shade of blue (Behr, Cloudy Day, if you're interested) and painted the dark brown door and wood trim a nice shade of white (Behr, Moonlight White, again, if you're interested).  The pedestal sink got a new brushed nickel faucet and we're all so happy to have a fully functioning hot water faucet handle :)  I happily threw away the old (once again, wooden) medicine cabinet and replaced it with a beveled oval mirror.  I simply spray painted the brass sconces that were already there with this really cool hammered metal spray paint...they look great!   Steve installed a whole new toilet...no more wooden toilet seat.  I almost cried tears of joy when I saw the garbage man throw the old toilet seat into the garbage truck :)  We opted not to re-hang the bronze chicken towel hook (once again, not making this stuff up) and replaced it with a simple brushed nickel towel ring.  And we also opted to replace the wooden, double toilet paper roll/magazine holder with a simpler holder that matches the new towel ring.  I also made a new valance and added some fresh towels.  I displayed some of my sea glass by the window and some framed lighthouse greeting cards (I bought in the Outer Banks years ago) completed the transformation.    

Outhouse Chic has been replaced with Seaside Serenity~

Here it is!  Fresh towel, framed NC lighthouses, new mirror, fresh paint, new beadboard~

The new valance, made by yours truly.  More framed lighthouses~

Steve's new floor...much nicer than Shiny Pebble!  New toilet and no more wooden seat :)

Seaside details...shells and seaglass~

We love it!  Steve, you did an amazing job and I am so thankful for all your hard work...you're wonderful!  I think we make a pretty good team :)


Come visit...and try out our new bathroom~


God bless~
Rach