Finishing the bathroom

Monday was my day off.


I finished the paint, touching up any areas that were needed.

I cleaned the floor several times, and started cleaning the mildew from the shower area.

It is still pretty gross! I need to break out the heavy duty cleaner.

I also have a grout touch-up paint, and will have to re-caulk the tub.



I wish I knew how to do ceramic tiles, or I'd re-do the back in a extravagant way!

There are a million amazing ceramic tiles at Home Depot.


But, it was hard enough doing the stick-on stuff, for the first time.


I laid out the tiles.

They have directional arrows, which I guess kept the pattern from getting too astray.


The tiles really aren't meant to match completely, but I tried anyway.


I spent at least an hour arranging the tiles in a way that didn't upset me.

Cutting the tiles took even longer.

I had to cut around the door jambs and around the toilet.

As the package suggested, I made stencils with paper.

This new kind of vinyl tile is thicker than the stuff I remember.

It didn't cut easily with a craft knife and ruler.

But it did fold along the score, and break in a straight line.

For the curves I was lucky, I had these aviation snips from my metal cutting experiments.

The craft knife worked really well to shave down the edges to make it fit.

I also had to re-caulk around the tub and toilet.

This is something I've seen on TV but never tried before.

In the end I got nervous and wiped most of it away!

Doing the floor took 6 or 8 hours, but it was fully engrossing. And painful.

My knees will be black and blue all summer.

But it will be worth it to have a bathroom I'm not ashamed to let guests use.



Dad helped by measuring and cutting the new base boards, today.

Now if I could only get my huge car carpet out of the patio, and clean up that mess, I might be able to have guests over...