Bathroom spruce up

Face it people, we spend a lot of time in the bathroom. Sometimes we rush in and out to check our hair or faces in the mirror. Sometimes it's an hour long bubble bath. But of course we probably spend the most amount of time just sittin' around. And when you spend that much time in one place you have plenty of staring at the walls to do.  So, it's nice to have a happy uplifting color to stare at. Like gray.

The main bathroom of my house made me happy the first time I entered the room.
You may ask: Really Christy? A bathroom made you happy? What kind of lame-o person are you?
And to that I say: Yes. And: Be nice!
Yes, I was pleased with what I saw because it meant as soon as I signed, it would be mine. In the case of the bathroom it was updated very nicely with a new sink and large cabinet, a new toilet (that may be one of the tallest toilets I've ever...er...know), and a lovely big three door medicine cabinet. But what made me smile specifically was the deep new Jacuzzi tub!  Woo hoo! There were only two things I didn't love about the bathroom: the paint and the vanity light.

The paint was a dull aqua bluish color and the vanity light was ugly. It was a plain rectangular wooden box with 6 light bulbs sticking out across the front of it.

The nice thing about the walls is a beard board and chair rail that goes just under half way up the wall. It's plain white and makes the bathroom look clean and fresh with the white framed medicine cabinet and white tub, toilet and sink. Anyway, I had been looking through Lowe's and Home Depot idea ads and decorating ideas and I saw a bathroom in deep gray, white and purple that I loved! So I started with that.

Now for redoing my bathroom I used those two money saving tips I talked about in the other posts. 1) oops paint and 2) clearance items! I found a quart of paint at Home Depot in the perfect gray color on the oops paint rack. For weeks there were little paint cards in various shades of gray taped along the wall across from the toilet and as time went by I would take down the colors I didn't like to narrow down just which shade I should get. Then suddenly one day I didn't even need those little paint samples; I was able to paint my bathroom for $1 in a color I love!

Mom helped with the painting as well as a few friends (Susen, Jenn and Mike). Mom cut in all around because she is great with that and got it looking good for me! I love the color. There was only one problem. It's very hard to match gray. Kind of like trying to match black or white; seems it would be easy until you have to do it, then you realize just how many shades there really are. So long story short, after taking back many towels and rugs to stores I decided to forget it and use completely different colors. But then the problem was deciding just which color to use. I like so many!

I used them all! Well, a lot of them anyway. There's a multicolored striped shower curtain which my mom gave me as a gift and was used Virginia. There are 4 main towel colors: orange, limey green, aqua blue and deep bright pink which I waited for a sale at JCPenney and got their big fluffy kind. And my newest purchase a double set of orange bathmats on sale for $5. 
Yes, I love that it looks like Crayola exploded in my bathroom! I think it's cheery, especially in the mornings!

That all fixed the problem of the dull colors in the bathroom, but the light fixture still needed help. Thanks again to clearance items and a random trip to wander around the hardware store I found a great replacement for my bathroom light for much cheaper than the original price! A 4 light brushed silver curving light originally $40 was on sale for $10 and amazingly (another one of God's gifts to me!!) there just so happened to be 4 smokey pendant glasses originally $6 on sale for $1.49 each! I snatched them up with a smile and thanked God all the way home!! He'd done it again; given me more than I'd hoped for but for a price I could actually afford!

 Installation: It may be a good time to add a "time saving tip" here. Just because one light fixture was centered how it was hung doesn't mean that a new one will be if you hang it in the same place. Oops. We had to un-install and reinstall it a second time. But with Dan's wonderful help it is back up and in business and well centered!

We also installed 4 great little box shelves. ("We" because I cannot hang anything straight! It's ridiculous! no matter how many times I measure it WILL not line up.) The two biggest are hung normal and the two smallest at an angle to form a diamond shape. I haven't figured out yet what will go in all of them, in one of the little ones I have rolled up wash cloths and in one big one I have perfume bottles. These shelves I bought also on clearance at Target. Originally they were priced at $12 and I got them for $3. Along with other little shelves I got for the hallway, but we will talk about those in the next blog.

All said and done I LOVE my new bathroom! It's bright, modern, and cheery! And so much more fun for just sittin' around in!