Bathroom Progress Part 4

In a marriage, spouses each take on different roles and responsibilities.  In our marriage, I somehow have the role of plumber and in particular, the one who installs toilets.  I’m not entirely sure how this happened but over nearly 22 years of marriage, 2 old houses and 4 bathroom renovations later, I’ve gotten plenty of practice installing toilets.  I vaguely recall expressing a mild interest in how it all worked – the mystery of indoor plumbing – and the next thing I knew, there was a wax seal in one hand and a wrench in the other.  My husband is a genius.

Honestly, installing a toilet is not difficult but it does take 2 people to lift the fixture.  There are probably lots of plumbers who do it themselves but not this plumber.  So our toilet is now attached and working (cheer!) although it had to be hooked up and then taken out again.  Without going into lots of details about a toilet, old plumbing doesn’t always get along with new flooring.  Now, it’s all working.

The floor is done and sealed.  In case you haven’t noticed, it’s in a gingham pattern.  I love gingham.

After painting walls, the next biggest improvement in a renovation project is shoe moulding.  Shoe moulding covers the space between the base moulding and the floor.  It really finishes a project.  You cut it with a miter saw and finally put to use those angles you learned about in geometry.

I don’t like the standard quarter round shoe moulding.  I like this moulding which is called “ogee stop” and is best installed with a power nailer.

The nail gun is one of my favorite tools.  I got to squeeze in behind the tub to attach the shoe moulding here.

Prime and paint your shoe moulding before you cut it with a miter saw.  It’s nearly impossible to get so close to the floor without getting paint everywhere.

These before and after pictures below are dramatic.  This is behind the bathtub and will never be seen but at least it’s patched, clean, and painted.

The real fun stuff – sewing the Roman shade and the shower curtain for the tub.  Striped fabric is for the shade and the floral is for the shower curtain.

The laundry chute is not going to work out.  We would need to rout (cut a hole with a particular tool called a “router” to fit) out the new floor and neither of us can bring ourselves to do it.  (Well, I said I can’t cut a hole in the new floor and my husband agreed – mostly.)  We’re headed to the ReBuilding center and to see if we have any luck and then probably back to Hippo Hardware because you never know what might be lurking in their basement.  We’re also dropping off our old sink and hoping to get a store credit for it.  Reduce, reuse, recycle – even during a house project.

Want to read more about our bathroom DIY project?
Bathroom Project Part 1
Bathroom Project Part 2
Bathroom Project Part 3
Goodbye Bathroom
Finding Inspiration for a Bathroom Re-Do