Bathroom Project

Bathroom Project

The picture below shows the original state of the upstairs bathroom in the house we bought. It was cluttered! Our plan to try to meet our mortgage payments was to convert this half bath to a full bathroom and rent out the downstairs bathroom and bedroom to college students at Gordon.  You can see we have our work cut out for us.

We removed all the clutter from the room and got it down to the shag carpet.  The toilet did not flush well and the sink did not drain well.  Our plan was to accomplish the following: remove the shag carpet, install tile, install a family size vanity, and install a bathtub with a shower.  What an intimidating task!  I would never call myself a handy man and I did not know where to start. 

Here is the carpet we wanted to replace with clean white tile. 

The bathroom was 60 inches wide, the perfect size for a tub although the slanted ceiling and window would certainly provide a challenge to installing a shower. 

Day 1 was fun and fairly easy! I ripped everything up with my friend Joe.  In hindsight I probably should have done my demolition more carefully because careful demolition makes for easier repair. 

Here we are in the midst of the chaos with our plumber Jon.  No turning back now!

This is why the bathroom sink was not draining. Yuck. 

The tub is now in place.  However at this point it was very hard to picture a finished project and I was so intimidated about all the hurdles I could see on the horizon. 

Hurdle 1, awkward floor holes: Patching the floor so it could bear weight required a really unique puzzle piece cut out of plywood.

We then put down cement board in preparation for tile. 

That crowbar made me bleed more than any other tool.  Probably because I would leave it around like in the picture above. 

Here is the floor completely repaired with cement board including a hole cut for the toilet drain pipe. 

My parents helped me an incredible amount.  I simply could not have done this project without them.  My mother is quite a carpenter!  I took a picture to prove it!  

Hurdle 2: I had to purchase electric box extenders to get these switches flush with the wall after we put in the dry wall. 

Here we have put in new insulation and you can see I still have a wooden window in the shower.  Wood and water are not friends, this will be a problem. 

Hurdle 3: There is a 1/2 inch gap on the back end of the tub.  I cut strips of plywood to function as studs on which to mount the 1/2 inch shower cement board. 

Hurdle 4: What to do about the window in the shower?  I know water and wood do not go well together so I purchased a custom vinyl window at Lowe's. This was very expensive and I am sure there is a cheaper way to get a good window. 

I made the mistake of taking the suggestion of the window guy at Lowe's to get a "new construction" window instead of a "replacement" window.  This created a lot of extra work for me.  I had to remove the trim on the exterior wall and then repair the stucco.  Bethany's aunt Sue was a huge help getting this vinyl window in. 

Here is the window in the shower with the cement board around it.  I bought a piece of vinyl siding for the window sill and used waterproof tape to seal the joints.  It is looking pretty water tight at this point. 

 Hurdle 5, laying tile:  I had no idea how to lay tile!  It was back to YouTube to watch videos and they were very helpful.  I quickly gained confidence and momentum and I found I did not mind laying tile.  It was fun and the result was well worth it.  I had to buy an angle grinder and borrow a friends tile cutting tool to cut all the tile pieces.  Make sure to lay them all out first because that thin set mortar dries fast!  My friend John bailed me out on this one late at night when I needed help.

 I used the spacers and they seemed to work well for me.  If you don't lay the tile right is it going to look bad! 

The best part is my wife really likes the tile!  Much better than the shag carpet.  It gives the whole bathroom a very clean and bright look. 

The next step was to grout.  This was also quite easy and made a big improvement on the look of the floor.   However, mixing up cement, grout, and thin set is messy business!   Make sure to have a disposal plan.  Mine was to put the leftovers in double plastic bags and immediately wash my buckets and tools. 

Hurdle 6: The heating duct came out right where the vanity was supposed to go!  I was going to have to learn how to do some basic duct work or call an HVAC professional and drive up the cost of the project.

I extended the heating duct to come out above where the mirror would go. Home Depot was a great store for this entire project!  They even keep an online record of your receipts.  This was really helpful for me because if I lost a receipt I could print it again and then return an item. 

The shower is almost ready to be tiled.  However at this point I was running out of vacation time and out of days before our tenant we going to move in.  What should I do?  I was not going to have the shower done when Jon was scheduled to come do the finished plumbing. 

Jon installed the vanity and the toilet.  They both work great!  Some friends from church came and helped me paint the bathroom light blue to go with the wood trim. 

I ended up hiring a guy named Chris to do the tile. Someone at Gordon knew him and he did a great job!  He did the whole shower in 1 day.  This helped the timeline considerably but hurt the budget.  This is one of those home improvement project trade offs you must consider. 

Hurdle 8:  How to hang a shower curtain on an angled roof?  There actually were no satisfactory ideas I could find on Google for this problem!  What is a tech minded guy to do when Google does not have the answer?  I decided to cut two pieces of wood and use 2 tension rods with flanges.  I think the end result looks pretty good!  

We asked a friend to hem the curtain for us and then had the plumber come back and finish the shower plumbing. 

Here is the curtain hanging nicely now that it has been hemmed. 

Hurdle 9: The bathroom did not have an exhaust vent so I needed to install one and this included cutting a hole through the exterior wall.  Yikes. 

 
Here is the vent installed and ready to go.

The finished ceiling of our new bathroom with the heating duct up near the top of the wall.  

We chose dark blue bath mats to go with the light blue walls.  It is primarily a two color bathroom, white and blue. 

The bathroom is finished and it has been serving us well.  Bethany said she feels like she is showering in a hotel!  The upgrade cost between $5,000 and $6,000 dollars for labor and materials. It took about 2 months to complete and I used 2 weeks of vacation time.  But now it is done! 

Big thanks to Home Depot, YouTube, Google, friends, family, and the provision of God for the final result of this bathroom project.  We are so grateful to have it finished.