Adventures in Remodeling - Bathroom #1

While I was tearing out the carpet and refinishing the floor and annihilating the existing kitchen, I decided just one more thing was necessary prior to my moving in and that was rip out the main bathroom and give it an overhaul.

Lovely

Sadly, I didn't get actual intact before pics because well, I just wasn't there to do the picture taking.  Regardless of the beauty you see above, saying the main bath was ugly is a HUGE understatement.

Not only was the 500 lb cast iron tub blue, but the sink hanging off the wall, in a lovely gas station sink kind of way, matched.  As did the toilet.  Those lovely blue tiles, or what is left of them, surrounding the sink were made of plastic and glued on with I'm not sure what.  I love the Tilex sitting there, because really, it's not helping anything.  It just looks sad.  I think I was trying to kill mold with it.  Or something.  Still, just sad.

Everything came out of this bathroom, down to the studs, trim around the door and the door itself to be painted and given a new knob, one that actually worked and even better, locked.  My sister came to visit me in May of 2007 and we were still leaning the door against the doorway as a means of closing it. Privacy is overrated anyway right?

Once everything came out and went into my backyard in the pile that was quickly getting out of control, it was insulated, cement boarded and drywalled.  I am so unbelievably thankful for the help I got with this project not only with the physical work itself, but the massive amount of learning that happened right off the bat.

I had a roommate at the time who was friends with a professional tiler who had also been a drywaller at some point in his life, so this bathroom was the first to get the tile treatment.  By the way, tile is not cheap nor is it lightweight.  Nor are the guys that install said tile.  At the time of this project my only means of transportation was a Honda Civic and yes, I loaded it down on more than one occasion with things that should probably never be transported in a Civic.  The tile trip loaded it down so much that it was difficult to turn or stop (I had the bathroom tile, kitchen tile and entryway tile in it).  In hindsight, I probably should have borrowed a truck, even an Accord would have been a better choice.

My awesome roommate/helper David

My helper/roommate, knowing my budget, hunted down a bathtub, picked it up and brought it home because it had to be placed before any work could go forward.  I had planned to replace the sink with a pedestal and the toilet goes in last (I figured, cuz you know, I'd never done this before...) so it had to wait.

Progress!

I received the picture above in a text while I was in class.  An ALL DAY SATURDAY class and it was all I could do to stay in my seat and not abruptly leave and go check it out.  I had decided to take the floor tile up the wall and behind the toilet in order to eliminate the need to ever have to paint behind or around the toilet and just to make it easier to clean in general since I was the proud owner of a teenage boy and was well versed in the damage inflicted on bathrooms by boys in general.  The "Tile Guy" who I don't even have a picture of, laid out a plan to make it all work, but of course that required a lot more tile.

Here is the mostly finished product and by mostly I mean that we could use the shower, but had to use another bathroom (there are two-ish more) if we needed a sink or a toilet.  Note the pot in the lower right hand corner. The reason said pot is there is because the bathtub was also serving as my kitchen sink.  Because I didn't have one.  I tore out the kitchen without a clue as to how to put it back together or how I would find the money.  But, that's just how I roll....sort of.

The two pics above are what it looked like just prior to moving and renting it out.  The door trim hadn't yet been painted.  The window in the shower was never covered because a) I was lazy, b) I didn't know what to put on it that wouldn't constantly be getting wet and gross, c) it was so high off the ground outside that no one could look in and finally d) it steamed up so fast it really took care of itself.

The mirror above the sink (not shown) was purchased off of craigslist and painted white.  The sink, mirror and light above is actually quite nice.  The original light fixture that went in above the sink I ended up hating because it was so dim and the bulbs cost as much as the fixture, so it was replaced.

The shower curtain rod had to be ordered as none of the building supply stores in the area sold one that was an "L" shape and it requires two shower curtains to cover because of the extended distance.  There was also a chain attached to a hook in the ceiling so the corner wouldn't sag.  In a rather fashionable manner, of course.