Remodelaholic

Finally! We have some "after" shots of the house. I'm going to post these one room at a time, starting today with our powder room!

Let's take a little journey back in time... to a time when you had to use THIS if you wanted to powder your nose downstairs:

The brass fixtures were a little less gleaming now than I imagine they were back in their heyday. The cabinet door was broken. There was a mysterious paper towel holder next to the vanity. (That's a new one for me. I guess the paper towels were there in case things got a little messier than usual?)

The grunge build-up on the laminate floors was enough to make you bulimic. And if you used the toilet (which we avoided), you quickly learned that it wasn't really screwed in to the floor, and rocked back and forth so you felt like you were on a fantastic roller coaster ride while taking care of your business. Not ideal.

You can't really tell in the picture above, but inside the old cabinet was a massive pile of hair. Er, weave. NASTY! And the walls were a much grosser color than they look here. I'd name it Green Baby Poo.

And then I'd throw it away.

So we changed things. We gutted the entire room, and left it that way for, literally, about a year. That meant an open toilet hole in our floor for a reeeeally long time.

But finally we stopped ignoring this room, laid the same hardwoods that we put through the rest of the downstairs, put in a shiny new toilet and fancy little vanity, new lighting, new window and window treatments, crown molding and our own little custom striped paint job!

First, let me say that this all came together thanks to my mom (and Andy of course!). She painted the room so I wouldn't have to inhale the fumes, then Andy and I taped off the stripes and together she and I painted a glaze in between the stripes. (Thanks Mom!)

I have to say, I expected the striped paint to look a little more homemade than it does. Up close, I think the stripes look kinda fabulous. In my own humble opinion.

Up next, we had to snag a fabulous vanity. I didn't want just any old vanity, and I'd been stalking this mirrored stunner online for MONTHS. But it was $1200. And that wasn't gonna fly with my husband, or with our budget. So I waited.

TJ Maxx HomeGoods sells fancy vanities at a great price, but they only bring in one or two a week, so Andy and I made it a weekly ritual to drive out to HomeGoods and check for a decent vanity.

Then one day, one magical, glorious day, they had the EXACT SAME vanity I'd been watching for online! I almost cried. It was love at first sight. But we asked the manager to drop the price anyway, and they did! The whole thing came out to around $200. How's that for fantastic savings?!

Wait, go back and look at that vanity again. *Swoon!*

We also scored the mirror at HomeGoods for about $20. I found the faucet set online for $40, then a week later I saw it in Home Depot for $140!

This was the last room we started, and the first room we finished. But I'm so happy that it's finished!