Bathroom redo . . .

Wednesday afternoon I came home from work and walked toward the kitchen. I stopped in the dining room to talk to the hubby and I felt a "plunk" on my arm. I happened to be directly under our upstairs bathroom. We have had major issues with that bathroom over the years and have had to rip the ceiling out a couple times so now we have a panel up there covering the hole. I ran upstairs just to make sure the water had not been left on, but no such luck.

At this point there was just a small little drip forming on the panel, but I knew it was not good. I unscrewed the panel and it dumped a couple cups of water on the floor that had been storing up there. Oh no.

Thanks for the power of facebook, I had just found out that a friend was a plumber and has his own business. I messaged him and he said he would be out on Friday morning. I stuck a bucket under the drip and tried to forget about it. Since it was coming from a supply line it was pretty consistent, but it was not very heavy.

Here's where my OCD comes into play. I could not sleep. I kept thinking that the supply line would just let loose and flood the downstairs. So I laid in bed thinking of projects to do! When I was pregnant with Harrison we had some problems with that same bathroom. The floor around the toilet had rotted and had no DIY skills back then. I took a 3x3 foot piece of plywood and simply put it on the floor. I didn't cut out the bad stuff, I just went over the top of it. So there was a little step up to our toilet. It has bugged me for years, but I have never wanted to attempt fixing it. Until 5am on Thursday morning, then I could think of nothing else! (my mind is a scary place! LOL) When I get something in my head, it must be done and done NOW.

I decided that we (my husband loves me!) would take on this project Thursday after work. We would, remove the trim, remove the toilet, rip up the current floor, place the bad spot, re-vinyl the floor, and reset the toilet. Easy peasy! I figured if I screwed anything up I would have a plumber there the next morning to fix it for me.

I would've taken before pictures, but I just couldn't bring myself to show you the nastiness of my bathroom. This is bad enough. You must remember I live in a 120+ year old fixer upper.


This was after the trim and old floor was removed. I had already patched the floor (a huge piece of almost 2ftx3ft). I was about 1/2 way into the project at this point and just past the "What the heck was I thinking" part. I made a template of the entire floor with newspapers. I have neer done this, but I have seen it on HGTV (my old favorite show Decorating Cents) and filed it away in brain for future use. Note to self: next time don't skimp on the tape.


Then I took the template downstairs and laid out the vinyl remnant I got for half price (woot). I traced around my template with a marker and cut the vinyl with an exacto knife (scissors work too). I then took vinyl upstairs and simply laid it on the subfloor. I did have a cut some areas a bit more carefully upstairs, but all in all it only took about a half hour to install the vinyl. I love the no-glue Dupont vinyl they stock at lowes. This one was originally 11.28 a linear foot and the rolls are 12 foot long. Really inexpensive and super DIY friendly.



I had some white quarterround trim before, but I like it chunkier. I simply used 1x3's. I did not even miter them. I will caulk and paint them later. I need to refresh some wall paint in certain places too.


I still need to caulk around the tub, that lovely blue monster is my fabulous cast iron tub. It really needs resurfaced, but she is a beauty!

While I would love my bathroom to be perfect with awesome materials, that is not my life. For instance, that awful vanity really needs a home in the dump! I have realized that I can only do so much and I find ways to make do with what I have and what I can afford. In the end, I think it turned out fabulously!

On to the porch . . . the husband doesn't know it, but he's gonna help me paint . . .