Movin on Up!

To the upstairs bathroom that is... This is the bathroom which the walls needed to be ripped out of after day 1 of move in. The problem? Ice frozen in the pipes, that burst, and then came through the walls. It was also the most hideous bathroom ever. I thought the downstairs half bath was the ugly ducking. Nope, not half as bad as this. Here is the bathroom

BEFORE: 

Well those were WAY before. As in before move in day, before the walls started leaking.. totally before. Have I mentioned yet in this blog how lucky we are to have my dad and my father in law? Both named George, which I know, is cute, right? So, my father-in-law has a building company. My dad is the teach yourself and become proficiently fabulous type. Both have been invaluable to this house process. But, for this particular part of the bathroom (you know, the walls leaking and pipes bursting part), Jamie called his dad to help us out... and here is the bathroom after the first major disaster:

PIPES BURST DISASTER

This was labeled "looking for leak"

Looking for leak... Hi George! That's my wonderful father in law trying to figure out what is wrong?!

So at this point, we realize, okay... once AGAIN we are in knee shoulder deep and need to fix this pronto. Oh goodness. So, we took this project on. Slowly but surely. We had to tear out the walls, the old bathtub, everything. Here are a few pictures in process:

IN PROCESS- WALLS TORN OUT

Yep, that is the door into the bathroom and on the right is where George was just looking for the leak...We found it, but it sure made for a lot of work!

Looking at the window... the round thing on the ground on the left is the toilet pipe and on the right, that big empty space that you can only have see is the space formerly known as the bathtub.

I would like this time to take a minute to thank our wonderful friends, The Beamans, and our friend Jeff, for letting us use your showers during this time. Yep, we lived without a shower. Luckily it was warm out when we ripped out the shower. One time, after a soccer game, Jamie smelled so horrid that I actually took the hose and sprayed him off. They were desperate times. So, if you have a one full bath house, my advice is not to tear out your shower.

Our friends Tom and Cyndi were visiting from Florida that summer. And do you know what we made them do? We made them help us get the new bathtub in place. Ahh, so nice. We also took on the most horrendous task of all time. New 12 inch tiles on the wall. But, we liked the floor tile looks best, so we tiled the walls... in floor tiles. O.M.G. I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy. I've never heard Jamie say so many bad words in one sitting. I've never hated a project so intensely. Thankfully, my handy dandy dad came to the rescue with some assistance on the grouting and then the plumbing work. My dad and Jamie's dad saved this bathroom. Without them, we'd be still sitting on the floor of the torn apart bathroom crying uncontrollably. Okay, exaggeration maybe... but not by much. Here are some pictures during the bathtub wall tiling and dry walling.

TILING/WALLS IN PROGRESS

new tub, bright pink waterproof tile primer!

Don't the tiles look gorgeous? You'd never know they were so evil... 

 

 

 

dry wall looks funny in the middle of the process.

So after the fight with the tiles and the plumbing, we decided we better get a new vanity. One of the companies Jamie's dad works with does custom work, so we decided we'd spend more money than our usual choices so we could have a double sink, and give Jamie the black granite countertops he really wanted. So, here is what we came up with... The one thing that still needs to be found is a mirror we love. I'm sort of obsessed with the bathroom mirror that Bower Power have in their bathroom. I want one. We can make one of these too, so I think that's the end-goal. Ignore the decor in the bathroom, it still has some more distance to go to get to where we want it to be...

AFTER

see the little mirror? we need a big guy to replace it.

Sort of funny that you can see our linen closet in the mirror. Oh, did I forget to mention the linen closet has no door? I kind of like it because it motivates me to keep it organized. Jamie says it is getting a door ASAP.

Here is a good picture of the shower hardware. and those big bad tiles again. Oh, and we have an extended half moon shower rod that gives us more space. love that too. Thanks Em + Nino! (Aren't we so weird? We ask for house things as Christmas presents)

There's our door-less linen closet. Ohh look at that cute Land's End beach bag my wonderful hubby got me for Christmas with my new initials on it! Can't wait for some Rehoboth summer days to use it!!

 There you have it, our bathroom upgrade. I think this room has been hands down the most hard work, but it is worth it. It's so pretty. And, it is the warmest room in the house. I often find our cats curled up next to the heating vent or tucked away on the floor of the linen closet. Speaking of our cats, one of them was following me around when I was taking pictures. This cat's name is Internet. Yep, that's right. Internet. Jamie named him. It was a compromise after he said he wanted to name our first child internet. In this picture below, he is yawning telling me how boring house renovations are to him. He just wants to curl up on the bed and be pet. 

My friend Kelly always forgets this little buddy's name. She calls him "Motherboard". 

 

That's all for tonight. Motherboard Internet is calling for some attention.  Dexter, our other bipolar-like cat will be introduced at another time!