Budget Bathroom Remodel Part Two

Note: This post is part two of a series about how we remodel our outdated, builder’s grade bathroom…all while doing it on a budget. Click here to see part one, and say tuned to the blog in the coming weeks for more updates and the full reveal!

Budget Bathroom Remodel Part Two

EIGHT months. That’s how long it has been since I posted about our big plans to do a DIY bathroom remodel. Spoiler alert…the reno isn’t done. In fact, we never even got started. Why you may ask? The short answer is a combination of bad luck, bad timing, and a bad case of procrastination. (Have I mentioned before that I am the queen of starting a project and then failing to finish it? Sigh.)

The long answer? Well, that takes a bit more of an explanation. Settle in friends. Here is part two of our budget bathroom remodel story, including how we got detailed and how we plan to get back on track.

Best Laid Plans

There is a saying about best-laid plans. No matter how carefully you prep, something may still go wrong. And that is exactly what happened with our budget bathroom remodel. Or, in our case, two things went wrong that stopped us before we could get started.

Problem Number One ~ The Help

A master of power tools I am not. Combined with the fact that I am just a teensy-tiny bit of a perfectionist, Kirk and I decided early on that we would ask for help with the biggest (and most challenging) part of our planned bathroom remodel. Laying a new tile floor.

Here is what our tile floor currently looks like. The grout is coming up in chunks, and some of the tiles are cracked. Clearly, it has seen better days. Besides all of that, we just don’t love it and are ready to make a change.

So we asked a friend who is a local handyman to help us. Everything was set, and we were on his calendar for the end of last summer. The flooring was going to be done before school started. Yay!

Then life happened. And all of a sudden, our friend was no longer able to help us with our project. So…we hit the pause button to regroup.

Problem Number Two ~ The Flooring

Help or no help, I was still determined to say buh-bye to our ugly chipped tile. Was I intimated at the thought of tackling the tile ourselves? Without a doubt, yes. But, I was also confident with the help of a few YouTube tutorials that we could figure it out. Maybe it wouldn’t be perfect, but anything would be better than the current flooring sitch. And we already purchased the new tile flooring. (Or at least I thought so.)

This is the flooring we picked out. As luck would have it, this exact tile was only available for purchase online. At the time, I didn’t even think twice about it. I order things online all the time. What’s the worst that could happen?

Well….when the tile arrived, half of the boxes looked like they had been run over by a Mack truck. The tiles were completely smashed!

So Kirk went back to the store to return the boxes of tile that were destroyed. He talked with a store associate who said they would place a new order for us, and they refunded us for the broken tile. Problem solved.

Fast forward to a few weeks later. When the new tile failed to arrive on time, Kirk called the store to get an ETA on our order. What we chalked up to shipping delays due to the pandemic turned out to be a major miscommunication. The tile never got reordered. Not only that, but the tile had now also been discontinued. And so, that was the proverbial nail in our DIY project coffin. We had no help. No tile. And now, the plans to get our bathroom remodel off the ground were completely derailed.

Bathroom Inspiration

That brings us to today. Now that you know why our project stalled out, let’s talk about how we are planning to get back on track, starting with some budget-friendly inspiration for our bathroom remodel. I shared my vision board in part one of this remodel series, but since it has been just a bit, I thought that these photos were worth sharing again.

When I was searching for inspo for our bathroom, I knew just where to start. If you are looking for dreamy spaces and DIY ideas, Pinterest is pure gold. I could spend hours there just scrolling through all of the pins. These images from Juniper Home, The Lilypad Cottage, Wayfair, and My DIY Happy Home, are some of my favorites.

The Bathroom Before

I always love to see before and after photos of a renovated space. Sometimes it is hard to believe it is even the same room! Our bathroom is very tiny, with high ceilings and an overall odd shape so it is hard to photograph, but here are a few more “before” photos of the space.

The Project Plan

While I wouldn’t consider our DIY a major reno (there is no taking anything down to the studs here), I am hoping that the change will be just as impactful. A couple of things have changed since I created this design board a few months ago, but this is more or less my vision for the finished bathroom.

Here is how we plan to turn our builder’s grade bathroom from blah into beautiful while sticking to a budget!

• Paint the walls. Like our current tile floor, the bathroom walls have seen better days and will benefit from a fresh coat of paint.
• Paint the vanity. I can’t wait to get rid of the outdated gold oak and give our vanity a much-needed facelift. All of the trim will also be getting a fresh coat of white paint, and we will be adding new brass hardware to the vanity as well.
• Replace the light fixture. The ’90s called and they want their light fixture back. I am more than happy to oblige!
• Update the hardware. We plan to remove all of the old towel bars and replace them with something new. (And a little less silver and shiny.)
• Install new faucets. If it’s builder’s grade, it’s a goner.
• Replace the mirror. We plan to replace the original mirror with a pair of mirrors that add a little more character and charm to the space.
• Redo the flooring. We are currently on the hunt for new tile. Fingers crossed we can find something soon!

Budget Bathroom Remodel Part Two

Now to get this DIY budget bathroom remodel done! I will be sharing our progress over on Instagram, so be sure to follow along there for updates. Hopefully, it won’t take another eight months to get it all finished. I can’t wait to share the full reveal with you, so be sure to stay tuned to the blog for all of the latest.

Wish us luck!

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