I could say the MR has been laying down the law, or laying down the winning hand, but even better, he’s been laying down tile upstairs in the girls’ bathroom.
We’re not professional remodelers around here, so sometimes it takes awhile. You may remember back in September, the MR started tearing up the girls’ bathroom. He removed a stacked washer and dryer and the surrounding closet freeing up a bunch of space. Then he tore out the old shower replacing it with a truly lovely specimen. We had the big reveal back in November.
About that time, I mentioned how truly awful the floor was and then went silent on the topic of that bathroom for the next three months. Haven’t you ever heard that good things take time? The MR, ever the busy man, broke out the tile on his birthday. Baby Girl and I aren’t total slave drivers. We bought him knee pads and goggles and gave him the next day off to watch the Super Bowl–go Seahawks!
So the MR spent this past Saturday and part of Sunday tiling most of the bathroom.
You may have noticed it doesn’t quite go around the toilet. You’re right, but this is by design. The toilet is beige and is on the chopping block. But having a working toilet upstairs for the meanwhile is important. So the MR is waiting to replace the toilet and tile around it all at the same time.
If you’re very observant, you may have noticed a strange grid next to the toilet. That would be the heated floor grid. The girls’ bathroom isn’t heated. We have heating units in both bedrooms and the main room upstairs, but the heated towel rack has been the only source of warmth until now in the bathroom. It may be a little frosty in there, but at least your towel is warm when you get out of the shower. Heated floors should help warm things up a bit.
We haven’t quite figured out what to do for the vanity. We know we want a two-sink vanity to make better use of the space. That’s about all we know. We have considered a dark cabinet with a lighter counter, or perhaps just the opposite, a light cabinet with a darker counter… Then we started wondering about continuity. Would it be odd if this was the only room with non-white cabinetry in the whole house? And then Baby Girl pipes in that she’d like colored cabinets in smoky blue. Should they be solid-panel wood doors like all the other cabinets? We’re at a bit of a stand still.
We have decided to go with darker grout. It’s interesting how the grout on the lighter walls looks dark and then on the floor looks really light, and it’s all the same grout.
All in all, it’s been three months, but we are actually making progress. The tile floors are the same tile the MR used as an accent in the shower. Maybe by summer, the bathroom will be done and Sweet Miss will be convinced to move home. I’m not making any promises, but slowly but surely, it’s getting there.
What do you think? White cabinets? Solid wood doors? Does it matter? Any bathroom remodels going on at your house? Are you in love with large-scale dark brown tiles?
FYI: I’ve made a Facebook page for the blog so I no longer have to hound my friend to read it. You can join the fan page on Facebook at “The Big White House on the Hill” and get all the regular posts plus extra photos without all the editing and verbage. I would have been just “Big White House on the Hill”, but the Belfast, UK, City Council stole it from me. OK, so they picked it first. We can all still be friends. Like the Facebook page or just pop in when ever you feel like it. It’s all good.
Crocheting with Kim 
Wait a minute, do you mean I can no longer just turn on my computer and there is your blog? Can I only read the blog on Facebook? Hmmmm, sounds harder to me, as I like to be reminded, and I am used to being reminded. So, will you no longer be found by thebigwhitehouseonthehill? What name will your blog have now? Are you sure this is better for you????? Enough about that. For years I have admired hotel public restrooms that have the trough sinks. Many people are able to use them at the same time, and seem to be built right into the counter top. They also have them in guest room bathrooms built for 2. Next, I go with the continuity of white cabinet doors, just like the rest of the house, unless you intend on changing the ones in the kitchen, and then what about the lovely white baseboards? BGs bedroom is a super crazy/wonderful color on the walls which is great for her ‘self expression’.but baby blue on the only room that can be seen from the next floor down, just doesn’t make sense to me, it just leaves me with a “why?” I truly don’t mean to sound disgruntles so I will end with a compliment, I AM IN LOVE with the huge tiles on the floor, and the grout as well. Great pictures Mrs, and great job MR..
Goodness Mary Kay! I’ve certainly gotten you excited first thing in the morning. If you subscribe to my blog, nothing has changed. You’ll still receive it in you in box.
The Facebook page is just for my Facebook friends who aren’t actual followers, they just check it out now and then.
It’s a way to distance me–Kim–from my blog. I don’t want to hound people to read my blog, read my blog, read my blog when they just want to see what the girls are up to and how I’m doing.
But you as a subscriber might want to like the Facebook page too. I will add extra photos up there too.
Hope that helps. Thanks for your input on the bathroom.
I love the bathroom, just keeps getting better. I agree with your MIL – I LOVE those new tiles and the grout! I, however, think dark wood cabinets would look so great in that bathroom. I don’t think there is anything at all wrong with straying from the white cabinets. It is its own room.
We recently started talking about remodeling our master bath (which is not large at all, but so nice to have). The small also limits us to what we will do. Probably rip out the old white tile in the shower, I dream of two shower heads at different heights. We did paint and put down new floor tile when we had the fire – so I hope that tile can be kept. Why we did not re-do the sink and vanity when we did all of that I will never know. It is a RED sink with an old light colored Formica counter – UGLY. We did paint the old 70’s cheap cabinet white to dress that up a bit.
But before we start that, we have to do the “kids” bath, which will be the guest bath by the time we do all of this. I have to have a working bathroom before we tear ours up. Now, the kids bathroom is working, but I will just say it has survived raising 9 kids – ONE bathroom! Four from the previous owners who built the home, and our own 5. So, it will be gutted before I use it. I am looking forward to having a bathtub again to soak in. We will see when the last one leaves home so we can start!
Sounds like you have some exciting times planned for your house. It’s fun to spif things up a little or in some cases a lot.
I’m leaning towards dark with a light granite counter that wouldn’t show water spots. We’ll see where we end up.
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