Bathroom Facelift Phase 2: Mirror & Light!

My bathroom facelift project is creeping along at a snail's pace...sorry about that! If you missed Phase 1, you can find it here.

Phase 2 consisted of building a frame for the mirror, and replacing the ugly (and crooked) racetrack light fixture!

There was absolutely nothing wrong with our builder-grade bathroom mirror. Not much that can be wrong with a big flat mirror glued to the wall--unless you count the "glued to the wall" part, which I do. I "googled" how-to-remove-a-mirror-glued-to-the-wall, and it really didn't look like a DIY-type project, unless I was interested in 1,294 years of bad luck! (I'm not!)

So the alternative was to embrace the glue concept, and build a frame which I could GLUE to the mirror! Oh boy!

I purchased two different pieces of molding to construct my mirror frame. The first piece was a plain rectangular board, and the second was a chair rail. Placed together, they made a nice wide frame.

I cut all the pieces to size, then used Liquid Nails to adhere the molding to the mirror. I used my thirteen-year-old daughter...and some Frog Tape...to hold the molding in place while the glue dried.


My cutting isn't perfect by any stretch of the imagination, and the boards aren't perfectly flat. So there are gaps to be filled, and I used a caulk on the little cracks, and wood filler on the big ones.

Looking better...

Next I replaced the "racetrack" style light fixture. I never noticed it was installed crooked until I painted the stripes! I didn't want to spend a ton of money on a new fixture; I found one that was nice enough for around $50.

Changing out a light fixture is really pretty easy. Just make sure you turn the power off FIRST!


Here's what the light box looked like after I removed the old fixture. There are three wires: white, black, and ground (usually copper colored).

These match up with the three wires on the new fixture.


Match up your wires and twist the ends together. Then you screw on the handy-dandy little plastic wire nuts.

Your new fixture will come with a mounting plate that screws on to your light box; there are usually no new holes to drill. Bolt your fixture to the mounting plate, and you're done!

See? New light! (I'm pretty sure it's the picture that is crooked, not the light.)


And here's the big picture...




I haven't yet replaced the towel or toilet paper holders because....well, I'm cheap. I haven't been in the mood to spend $30 (minimum) to replace something that is really still OK. Hopefully I'll either a.) win the lottery, or b.) find a great sale!

Nothing is on the walls yet, either. Still waiting to be inspired for that one.

And then there's the cabinet. To paint or not to paint? What do you think?

Bathroom Facelift Phase 1: The $5 Paint Job

The most-used bathroom in our house is probably the one on the main level. There are two nice bathrooms upstairs and one in the basement, but the convenient little half-bath is surely the most popular. And...it's the one any guests use.

Not exactly a recipe for success.

Several years ago I put up a nice textured wallpaper and a lighthouse border that I found at Lowe's. It wasn't expensive, and it was better than those plain white walls.



Like the way the kitchen dishtowel gets pressed into service as a hand towel? This is real life, folks!


Here's the big problem: every little kid who has sat on this toilet has been inexplicably drawn to the seam in the wallpaper.

Pick...Pick...Pick...

That section of the wallpaper has been put back together (like a jigsaw puzzle) on multiple occasions! (Thank you, Elmer's Glue.) After years of this, may I just say...

I am so over wallpaper.

So last weekend...I was bored.

What to do...what to do... I know!

Let's rip all the wallpaper out of the bathroom!

So I did.

The top vinyl-y layer comes off in big sheets, leaving behind the paper backing and the adhesive. If you're planning on removing wallpaper, your next two best friends are these:


A squirt bottle and a plastic scraper (I use the kind kitchen stores like to give away).

Once all the paper was gone, I washed down the walls with TSP to remove any glue residue. I've never done that before, but it seemed like a good idea at the time!

Now...the paint! I bought a $5 gallon of "oops" paint from Lowes, and base-coated the whole bathroom in a nice creamy white.

But it needed a little pizzazz! So after much measuring and leveling, I marked out the wall for STRIPES!!

I measured the wall from the ceiling to the top of the baseboards, and divided it into 7 stripes, each 11.5 inches wide.


I placed the tape on the outside of the stripes I would be painting. Then, using a trick I have learned from Blogland, I quickly ran a roller with my base color over the inside edge of the tape (the edge that was going to be the new color). This seals the edge of the tape, and any bleeding that happens isn't noticeable, because it's the same color as the base coat!

Genius, I tell you; sheer genius!

The color for my stripes was a mix. I tried using the same tan color I have in the rest of my house (Martha Stewart Woven Flax--love it), but it seemed too dark. So I mixed some of the Woven Flax with my $5 paint and came up with a softer tan. Perfect.

So, without further ado, here is my newly striped bathroom!

See? No more jigsaw puzzle next to the toilet!

Love the super-clean stripes. I had to do very little touching-up.

Not bad for a $5 paint job, don't you think?

Still to come: a frame for the mirror, new light fixture, painting the vanity (I think), and the frou-frou!