The Ceramic Womb

…is what we call our “master bathroom.”

Here’s a funny anecdote.. if you google image search “Master bathroom,” this is what you come up with:

Don’t believe me?  Go ahead, click it.

For the record, most of those gigantic bathrooms are actually bigger than our entire house.  Who has that kind of space?  Also, what are these people doing in their bathrooms?  Hosting parties?  Exactly how many people are in this bathroom at any given time? The entire Duggar family?  I digress.

Here is our “master bath” from our first tour of our home —

“Master” Bath

The wood on each side of that picture is the molding framing in the sliding pocket door (can I just say I love pocket doors?).  Then, following the picture in from the left, you see the glass shower door the pink wall of the shower, and the grey toilet.  In the far right of the picture, just before the pocket door molding for the other side, you see the pedestal sink peeking out.  It’s a little hard to tell in two dimensions, but between the shower wall in the middle of the picture and the edge of the sink, is just enough room to slide through sideways to the toilet.  It is cramped to say the least. In the almost year (holy smokes) that we’ve lived here, we’ve both showered in this room one time each.  It is very cramped.  Also, I am sure you’ve noticed by now that the entire thing is pepto pink.  I want you to be assured that the inside of the shower is as well.  Every surface inside that shower – floor, ceilings, and every wall – is also this pink tile.  Thats why we call it the ceramic womb.  It is awful.

We have big plans for this bathroom, but I’ll get to that soon, this post is already getting huge just enjoying the sights.  Let’s just say, hubs went all hulk smash! on the thing and it no longer has a shower or 4 walls.

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Stay tuned!

Our Main Bathroom – Paint!

Behr Mined Coal Enamel Paint

 

This is the color we painted the walls & ceilings of our freshly face lifted main bathroom.

Our first before & after reveal – The Main Bathroom, AFTER(ish).

It’s now time for the big reveal.. our main bathroom!

As the caption above states, here’s the new view from the hall!  Please forgive the mismatched towels– just keeping it real (haven’t bought new ones yet – that’s part of why this is “after-ish”

View from the doorway

By far our favorite part of our “new” bathroom is the solution we came up for the medicine cabinet.  Since we wanted such a large mirror and definitely needed a light in our bathroom *duh* – we couldnt use the traditional swing out door.  So we put it on drawer tracks that we got off of Amazon for about $16 !  I think the results are pretty awesome!

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Our first before & after reveal – The Main Bathroom, During (Mirror Removed)

After removing the giant vanity that was there, we discovered some live wires just hanging out.

After we removed the giant vanity from the wall, we discovered this hole for a medicine cabinet (more on that later 😉 haha) and some live wires.  Here’s a pic of Kevin dealing with those.

Our first before & after reveal – The Main Bathroom, During (Toilet Replacement)

Installing the new toilet

New and shiny!

Here’s some progress shot and an after glamour shot of the new toilet bowl!  Ooooh shiny.  I lucked out and married a Boy Eagle Scout that apparently  came equipped with knowledge of how to do such things, but just in case you didn’t, here’s a great link on how to do it over at Young House Love, a favorite blog of mine.

Our first before & after reveal – The Main Bathroom, During (Old Toilet Removal)

Old toilet removed!

The poop chute.

Pictured here, my adoring husband posing with the gross bottom.  He promised me that this isn’t #2 – it’s toilet wax ring residue and assorted dirt that creeped underneath the toilet.

This step is important in toilet replacement because if you leave all that nasty gunk there, the new toilet won’t get a good seal around the hole… and I don’t have to tell you why that  seal is crucial to your enjoyment of the new toilet. 😉

Our first before & after reveal – The Main Bathroom, During (Mirror Repurposing)

Mirror Repurposing

 

We wanted a large tall mirror to make the small bathroom feel larger.  Big mirrors are expensive, so we decided to use an old one and repurpose it for this.  This mirror originally had a rounded arch top, but a quick swipe of the circular saw and a plain mirror was revealed.  Then, we used some paint stripped and sandpaper to even everything out.  A coat of paint later and it worked out perfectly… to be continued.

Our first before & after reveal – The Main Bathroom, During (Vanity Removal)

Removing the old vanity

After the vanity was removed

Here are some progress shots of during and after the old vanity was removed… goodbye sea shell.  For a reminder of what the bathroom looked like before, see this post here.

Frog Tape & Enamel Paint.

Frog Tape doesn’t work with Enamel Paint

I love Frog Tape.  I swear by it.  We used it to paint our walls to protect our freshly-painted ceilings and our not-ready-to-be-painted trim.  We’ve bought a LOT of it since we’ved moved into this house.  It was only natural we would use it when we went to paint our bathroom.  Turns out… if you read the label, it doesn’t work with enamel paint.   I didn’t and this is what happens.  Be forewarned.

Our first before & after reveal – The Main Bathroom, During (Paint Fixin’)

Before we did anything, I had to remove all of the old paint from the top of the tile. There was no ‘clean line’ where the paint stopped.

One of the first things I tackled for the new bathroom was removing the old paint off of the top line of the tile.  I really liked the mint green & yellow combo, thankfully, so this was more of a facelift than a reno.  But the last owner painted the bathroom a very plain white and got it all over the tops of the tile.  In the pic above you can see where I removed the paint starting from the right and was working my way left.