Over this past year of home ownership, I (Sara) have discovered I have a special talent – I can find anything at Home Depot. Anything. That little dohickey that Dave can picture in his head but has trouble translating into words? Found it. Found it in an aisle three aisles away from where he was looking. Who knew I’d be so handy? It’s like I hold a PHD in shopping, luckily Dave is super talented at putting the parts together. We make a good team.
On our latest project, we decided to tackle the tiny bathroom attached to our master bedroom. We started talking about this bathroom years ago while staying in a suite at the Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas where I was enamored with the tub and the stunning aqua tiles. I stayed up late using the little notepad drawing up ideas to layout the room and bathroom. It morphed as we dreamed of a door leading out to a deck with a hot tub, possibly a wet bar so we could have coffee in bed, big picture windows looking out into the woods surrounding the tub, handmade blue lantern and penny tiles from Morocco – we dream big.
But here’s the reality. I called it the creepy bathroom because there was almost always some creepy crawly thing hiding in there waiting to kill me. I could tell you a comical story about the time there was a spider on my leg and I couldn’t get away from it because I was putting Vick’s vapor rub on my feet for a cough but we don’t have time for that. I wouldn’t use the medicine cabinet because I didn’t know what was hiding in it and there was evidence something was hiding in it. So one night, Dave cleaned the medicine cabinet – a really good deep clean and he decided he would caulk the separated seams to keep the crawlies out. But he couldn’t live with the faucet because he likes a single handle, not two. So we shopped for a faucet and stocked up on caulk. But do you put a fancy faucet in a bathroom you don’t love? Or buy cheap? Do the cheap ones hold up? None of these cheap faucets have the drain stopper we need. Oy vey!
While standing in the bathroom discussing faucet heights, I noticed something on top of the window molding. And there he was. The offensive creepy crawly leaving gifts in the medicine cabinet. A gigantic millipede. Ewwwww! Obviously I stepped out of the very small bathroom now inhabited by my husband and this giant bug he’s trying wrangle and scream again because there’s something living on the molding above the bathroom door! Relax, it’s just the key. We’re replacing the medicine cabinet now!
So we’re going to have an expensive faucet and a nice medicine cabinet over this vanity we don’t really love that has super limited counter space? Let’s replace that, too! And this is the story of how we went from “Let’s move this wall and expand under the house and put in french doors!” To the reality of this:
I think only 24 hours had passed between “Maybe a new vanity….?” and Dave tearing the old one out.
It’s not my dream bathroom but it’s functional and less creepy and I love that. That wall to the right? It was supposed to go but we opted to make the bathroom usable now and not wait 10 years while we “figure it out.”
We found a cheaper version of the Kohler vanity we used upstairs, it’s all aluminum and since it’s recessed into an exterior wall, Dave caulked the outside to keep moisture and bugs out. We found the cabinet at our place in the city where we also purchased all of our kitchen and upstairs bathroom cabinets. We opted for white to give the room a light, clean, modern feel. We went with a banjo counter so we’d have extra space to charge our toothbrushes and try to keep the area around the sink less cluttered. I spent an extra $50 to have tile back splash instead of the short quartz pieces that come with the counter top. I think this gave it a nice feel, will be easy to keep clean, and gives our tiny room a touch of character. In reality it also meant we didn’t have to re-texture and paint where the old vanity which was 2 inches taller and its back splash were attached. It was pure kismet that we found tile the exact height we needed between the mirror and counter. We added those sockets to the left because the socket on the right is so close to the cabinet you have to choose between plugging something in and using the cabinet. This is where having a brother in law who’s an electrician comes in handy! The socket heights don’t match because we were working with an exterior wall with lots of studs and window framing but that’s ok because function is key. We went with the same Hansgrohe faucet we have upstairs in a different finish because we really love it.
Obviously, it’s not done but after a week of my husband disappearing at every opportunity (read: times when I did need him) to get this thing done, I’m pretty darn proud. It wasn’t easy, he worked his butt off and there was that call while I was getting my haircut about how the counter top might need to go back because it wasn’t sitting right and losing two hours driving to SF to talk to the quartz guys… but there is no reward without a bit of stress, right?
Next, we’ll straighten the drawers, get some receptacle covers, add our sleek black handles (that I’ve been carrying around in my purse), paint the doors to the built in storage (white to match or pale gray), and try our hand at some linoleum tiles.
Dave showing it off to me now that we can really see the finish line! And as Dave says, “You can finally wash your face in here now!”
Skokan Team with RE/MAX Star Properties 