This and That and That and That

 I confess I have been spending a lot of my time lately lying on the couch, reading. But I haven't been a total sloth.

The last of my blue and yellow fabric arrived, and it has been washed, ironed and cut into the strips I need for my next project. I hope to be sewing later today.

I'm going to make a wonky rail fence quilt, from Sujata Shah's book Cultural Fusion Quilts.

Earlier this year I was walking through the house in the middle of the night and I tripped on something and fell. I knew where I was and what was where, but that could have been bad. In my trips to the hardware store I discovered small motion sensitive lights, and have since installed them in strategic places around the house. Now no midnight trips to the bathroom or anywhere else in the house will be made in total darkness. I've also installed a couple in some of my kitchen cabinets so their contents are no longer in the dark. These also mean I no longer have to leave a light on all day so I won't walk into a darkened room.

Flowers are nice, but watching them wither and die isn't much fun. Since the guest bathroom is filled with light (but not direct sunlight) I decided to buy these small succulents. They satisfy my desire for plants in that room and fill the corner in an interesting way.

I have tried to bring stuff to Goodwill twice in the last four weeks and been stymied each time. The fist time the place was roped off and there were no less than SEVEN police cars with their lights flashing nearby. Turns out there was a bomb threat. I'm just speechless. Who would do that? The world has become a very scary place. I went by again yesterday and the drop off was closed. I'm hoping to make a return trip later today. I still have lots more stuff to donate.

I went clothes shopping. The last time I bought clothes in a store was in 2019. Since then I've bought a couple of pairs of jeans and some nightgowns, but I really needed things, so I made a list. I bought turtleneck shirts, pull over and cardigan sweaters, and some tops. Everything was on sale so I was a very happy camper.

After days of phone tag, I finally have an appointment for a colonoscopy. It's in February. (sigh)

Lastly, I went to the Apple Store. My iPad is over six years old and is showing signs of age. I wanted to update it. While there I talked about possibly getting a slightly more robust one than the one I have now, but using it to replace my Windows laptop. I'm paying for backup software, antivirus software, security software as well as other applications. All those costs go away if I make the switch to Apple. So I am considering it.

And I'm trying to get rid of Comcast.

 

Light vs Dark

 

Of course I considered a light option. I actually bought a roll of each.

I tried a swatch of each here.

Here is what the light wallpaper looked like.

 

Here is the blue.

Turning to the right a bit, you can see that I've used the glass containers to store utensils. I think they look a lot better.

 

This side of the counter has changed a lot since I started this. I got rid of my toaster oven, and in its place is a white bread box. It hides the breads, buns and wraps. I've added a few fun things. I've been collected blue and white serveware for a long time, and it's nice to finally show it off.

In the end, the decision will come down to which one I like better. Right now it's the blue. Note I do plan to incorporate some under counter rope lighting.

HOWEVER...

This is my hutch area. I've replaced my Fiestaware with my collection of blue and white dishes. As you can see, the backing is brown. I will be painting this cabinet some version of white, and I will wallpaper the back wall with the LIGHT wallpaper.

I've also replaced all the hardware. I like it SO much better.

So here's a curve ball. I was talking to my Mom and she wondered if I should continue the wallpaper right across the back wall in the dining room. That would be interesting. I wonder if the blue would be too much, but I know the light would be easy on the eyes, but I worry it would be boring. I dunno. We'll see.

Now to your comments... the light version has been considered, as well as under cabinet lighting.

About the "Oh my god, you can't paint wood" school of thought, I disagree. It isn't gold. There is no rule that wood should never be painted. 

However I can see hiring a pro. 

I actually love to paint, so for me, once I get it all cleaned and sanded, painting is a breeze. I like painting as much as I like sewing. 

I will definitely replace the range hood. I'll get a stainless steel one, and I'd remove the strip of wood above the stove so I will place the wallpaper so I get a great design to fill that space. I will also consider replacing the countertops. (because, if you are going to do something... do it right. Complete the task!)

Eventually I'd replace the flooring too. There are a lot of design considerations to think about.

Wanda, you and I are both "height challenged" so the only thing that lives on top of the fridge at my house is something very light. For me it is all the plastic storage containers.

I thought about changing the hinges, but it turns out I can't get any where the holes match the ones that are already in place. So I chose hardware that looked a lot like the hinges. Every design has to work around some limiting factors. 

NOW! I have a funny story. My sister came by over the weekend to pick up her quilt. I wanted her to come over so she could see my new bathroom. She walked over, and turned the corner, and stopped dead in her tracks, "OH FUDGE!" (that's not what she said.) "OH this is... this is..." she faltered.

"Well, I knew it was going to be beautiful, because well, it's YOU, but oh shoot, Lynne, this is fudging gorgeous. This is... beautiful." She looked at every detail. "You know," she said, "You showed me the wallpaper. I was with you when you picked out the shower. You showed me the vanity and the faucet and all the hardware. But I didn't expect this. I mean, oh geez. This is awesome. The mirror is perfect. The shower doors, the towels, the vase, the stool, the print. I can't believe it. I mean I can believe it, but oh my god. It's incredible."

To say she made my day is a dramatic understatement.

Where From?

 

Marybeth wondered where the wallpaper came from.

I got it online at Home Depot. I ordered the shower faucet, shower doors, the metal shelf and the vanity all at homedepot.com. The toilet, shower pan, enclosure and shelves, the lighting fixture, the sink faucet, towel racks and hooks, the new doorknob and the flooring came from the local Home Depot store. So did all the nuts and bolts, paint, plumbing and trim that you can't see. In other words, just about everything came from Home Depot.

The round beveled mirror came from the local Lowe's. HD had a lot of round mirrors the right size, but they all had frames I didn't like, and none of the mirrors were beveled.

The towels came from Lands End. The "gold" soap dish came from the local Target (found when I was shopping for something else). The bathmat came from the local Home Goods. The black teak shower stool, and the black clock came from Amazon. The print (it isn't pen and ink) was from my own collection. I had it framed locally. The floral vase wastebasket was from an online florist wholesaler.

Julie asked me if the real bathroom looked the same as it did in my head when I designed it. My answer was, "Yes." I have never had any trouble visualizing what something was going to look like. But this was a lot like designing a quilt. To wit:

I picked the wallpaper first. That gave me my color scheme. I knew the fixtures would be white, but now I had grey and gold. I knew right away I did NOT want gold faucets. I wanted shiny chrome. I wanted the gold to be an accent. (And this is interesting too: I prefer silver to gold jewelry.)

Then I chose the vanity - a medium gray.

The grid on the shower doors,

the towels,

The squareness of the soap dispenser.

The shower faucet

and the metal part of the light fixture was no accident. All those things were chosen because they relate to each other. They repeat the same shapes over and over.

Likewise the print with its black frame (and by the way, paper artwork in a bathroom is generally a no-no because of the humidity, but I live alone and never close the door when I shower).

The black shower stool, (the yellow Waterblade squeegee is no accident either)

the black clock and the black and white cat vase (top photo) were all carefully curated. In fact, the face of the clock itself,

the sink faucet,

and the towel racks share the same modern/traditional elements. Not severely modern, but all ever so slightly curved.

Even the flower vase wastebasket, chosen as Ruth noted, for it's small footprint, meets the design requirements. It also adds a touch of whimsy.
 

Everything is understated, not over the top, not fancy or fussy. If I had gone for an ornate mirror frame, fancy curvaceous fixtures and a lot of gold, the room would have looked overdone, and cheap. There is one gold element, and it's this small dish that I saw at Target. It satisfies your eye's need to find something else "gold" in the room, yet it's shape reflects the organic floral shapes in the wallpaper.

When I designed it, the idea I had in my head was that of a small glittery "jewel box." I wanted something  modern in terms of utility, but attractive, stylish and classic.

Friends and guests mention it is a "pretty" room, implying it is explicitly female, I say that if the wallpaper is removed, and the room is painted a dark blue (for example), the round mirror replaced with a rectangular one, the room would be suitably "male" without changing anything else. To me, THAT is good design.

It's DONE!

     

 

I got home from work last night, and the shower doors had been installed in my bathroom. I was blown away at how good it looked. It looked BETTER than I had imagined. There's a  bit of blue tape in place because the caulking has to dry overnight, and the safety labels had to be removed from the glass, but I was thrilled. 

I had known the installation would begin, so I had moved a lot of the accessories out of the room.

After I put everything back, this was the look.

This was the bathroom "before."

This photo shows the old tub/shower combo. Every single thing in there got replaced. The tub,the toilet, the vanity, the sink; the floor, all the hardware, towel racks, shower and sink faucets, the light fixture, the doorknob; the walls and the mirror. Even the artwork, the soap dispenser, soap dish and the clock were replaced. I also replaced the wastebasket and the cleaning tools.

Herewith: The Grand Tour.

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The vanity has soft-close doors and drawers, and has lots of space for cleaning supplies, toiletries and extra rolls of toilet paper.

The wastebasket is a galvanized metal floral bucket from a floral supply wholesale outlet.

 

There is only one thing that was in the old bathroom that is in the new one; the cat vase given to me by a fellow cat blogger as a "secret paw" Christmas swap.

Oops

 

A stud can be a hard thing to find, and if you haven't got a stud then you use a plastic anchor, and sometimes those don't work very well. Case in point, the metal shelf and towel rack above the toilet.

You can't tell much in the picture above, but the rack was leaning down. It wasn't level. It wasn't very solidly attached. Oh darn. What to do?

Well, we could attach a piece of wood (painted white) to the wall, screwed to a stud, and then attach the towel rack to that.

But that would look a little weird. I had an idea. What if I covered the piece of wood with wallpaper, and matched the pattern?

So that's what I did. After all, I am the queen of fussy cuts. I can do this. Can you say "Ruler Trick?"

Considering I "winged it" I think I did pretty good. This is the piece of wood attached the wall and notice how you CAN'T see where the screw is. That's because I patched it with another piece of wallpaper. (Nyah, ah, ah!)

Then we attached the little brackets.

It worked like the proverbial CHARM!!

Finishing Touches

 My best pal Julie is coming to visit me next week. I have been working hard to get the house looking good. Mostly because I want it to look good for myself, but having company come is great motivation to get things done.

The Family Wall in the corner of my living room is all done. I have raised all the pictures that hung on the left side of the drawing of my grandmother and great-aunt, and I also raised the diamond shaped frame on the right. The postcard from my Dad hangs below that, and in the empty space that was left, I hung one of my quilt calendars showing a picture of Millie lying on a quilt Julie made. I also found a picture (a printed one!!!) of my granddaughter, so that is on the bureau as well. What's interesting is that picture is close to a photo of my son and I when he was the same age - and their smiles are alike!

The guest bath is almost complete. The shower door was partly delivered yesterday - the frame and handles were delivered, but the box with the doors themselves were not. I am hoping they arrive on Monday. They won't be installed before Julie's visit, but that's OK with me. Everything else is done except for a couple of finishing touches.

This cat vase Michelle gave me when I adopted Millie over 15 years ago is the only thing from the old bathroom that will be in the new one. I thought the room needed something, so I brought the vase to my favorite florist in town.

The opening for flowers is very small, but they were able to make a lovely arrangement. The mirror reflects the rose and makes it look like the bouquet is larger than it is.

Sometimes your frame of reference can affect the way you see something. I used to hate the big spa tub in my master bath, but when I dressed it up and made it look pretty, I liked it. So I carried on with that idea.

You can see in the little toilet / shower room that I have replaced the ugly round light fixture with a small chandelier. It cost me forty bucks, but now the room has sparkle and pizzazz. I also replaced the towel bar in there, the toilet and the floor, and hung up a framed print. Now the room is something I am proud to show off.

The final improvement to my master bath was a new light fixture over the mirror. The sharp-eyed among you will recognize the light fixture as a duplicate of the one in the guest bath. I had originally chosen a wider version, but the wiring wouldn't allow it. The solution? Two smaller ones side by side. I literally looked at hundreds of light fixtures and came back to these.

To renovate this room would require rebuilding it, and that's not going to happen any time soon, if ever. I like the changes I made and quite frankly I'm done with renovating for a while. I'm eager to get back into the studio, and believe you me - I will! Julie and I have sewing planned.

Julie arrives in four days...

Sneak Peek

It's a good thing I'm kind of a skeptic. I read the instructions on how to install the mirror, and marked up the wall where it would go. But when I looked at the back of the mirror, it didn't make any sense. So I measured the back of the mirror down to the bottom of where the support bracket (shown screwed to the wall) would be. 

Good thing. If I had followed the instructions, the mirror would not have looked good at all  - it would have been about four inches higher than I wanted it to go.

An aside, and a true story: When I graduated from college I got a job at an Art Supply store and worked as a professional picture framer. We had a wall mounted mat cutter, which was a real sweet piece of engineering. I figured it out right off the bat. There were instructions on how to cut a multi-opening mat. Me being me I planned a mat with FORTY openings. I cut it twice before I got it perfect. But I had read and re-read the directions the manufacturer (a small company) had written. I met the guy at a trade show and told him about my 40 opening mat. "You're brave," he told me. "Most people don't cut multi-opening mats with my cutter."

 "Well that's because you made a math error in your instructions," I told him, "and then that compounded itself over and over. I'll send you the corrections I made."

I don't know if that experience taught me to use my own brain if written instructions didn't make sense, but so many instructions nowadays are poorly written.

 

Anyway. I hung the mirror.

And looking at this picture made me realize I have to paint THAT side of the door as well, since it is CLEARLY cream and looks kinds funny.

So here's a sneak peek into the almost finished bathroom. Only finishing touches (aside from the shower doors) remain.

To say I am pleased is a gross understatement. I am positively over the freaking moon about it. I wanted something classic, and elegant. I envisioned a small jewel box. I think that's what I have.

 

OK, one more thing. I returned the extra roll of wallpaper. The gal behind the counter was one of those know-it-alls, jaded and frustrated with the world. I waited patiently while she took care of some minor disaster. She handled my return without issue, and then looked at the roll of wallpaper.

"Is this wallpaper" she asked, somewhat disbelievingly?

I nodded.

"It's so PRETTY," she said, eyes widening.

"Let me show you some pictures," I said, bringing out my phone.

"OMIGOSH, It's BEAUTIFUL!"

Yeah.