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Thursday, June 23, 2011

Before Blogging Throwback Thursdays #4 - One Fish, Two Fish

This month's party snuck up on me.  I've been super busy with the end of the school year's physical party planning, and the blogosphere has been jumping with the big Blog Party being co-hosted by a dozen fantastic bloggers.  Last month we had a great turnout, and hopefully we'll get a nice turnout despite my lack of planning.  So having done absolutely no planning, I got up this morning and walked around the house looking for something to take pics of.  Here's what I came up with.  The kids' Under The Sea bathroom.

This project started when we had to rip into the wall behind the shower in the toilet alcove.  We had some frozen pipes, and there was no access panel, so we had to cut a hole into the wall to fix the leaking pipes.  We wanted to keep access to the pipes available, but I didn't want an ugly door, so we built this removable recessed magazine rack.  It's basically a box with some doweling, and some applied case molding.  The whole unit can be pulled out if need be, because it just sits in the hole with no nails or anything.

As long as we were ripping into walls, I figured that was as good a time as any to replace the salmon colored toilet with a white one, pull down the apricot & blue floral wallpaper, remove the speckled tile wainscoting, and pull up the yucky bathroom carpet(why?!)  The tile floor was ugly and missing in a few spots, and we didn't have the budget to replace it.  I found an ugly $12 remnant piece of sheet vinyl flooring and flipped it to it's back side and painted it a sandy mix of colors with a couple of trompe l'oeiul accents like this starfish.

I found a remnant piece of green shag carpeting that I thought looked like anemones, and had it cut and bound into rugs for in front of the sinks and tub.

The whole room was painted including the ceiling.  I wanted the walls to look like a giant picture book, so I painted my sea critters in a cartoony style.  These floating shelves went in over the toilet.

The window needed an easy care valance, and what could be lower maintenance or more appropriate than a fishing net.  I got this net at the craft store, and boy did it ever stink when I pulled it out of the package.  If you're planning on recreating this look, make sure and give yourself time to air your net out outside for a couple of days before bringing it in.

The bathroom had a giant plate glass mirror like you'd find in a movie theater restroom.  I created a frame for it with 1x4 lumber and wrapped the frame in hemp rope.  It was easy to do, but my hands were torn up something awful by the time I finished wrapping the frame even with leather gloves.

Not wanting to miss a detail, I painted a switch plate cover at the local paint your own pottery store,

and hung the shower curtain from little fish hooks.

I'm linking this up to A Glimpse Inside's Catch a Glimpse Thursdays, Paisley Passions' Thrilling Thursdays, Funky Junk Interior's Saturday Night Special, Remodelaholic's Anonymous, and I <3 Naptime's Sundae Scoop.  That's my Before Blogging entry, now let's see yours.

Remember this is a party for anything you bought, made, or did Before Blogging.  Could be something big or little, just something you'd like to share.  This link will be open for a week, so you have plenty of time to take a pic and link up.  You can grab a party button here.

12 comments:

  1. Oh my gosh, this is so beautiful! I can't believe you painted this whole mural... you have incredible talent! And that fishing net valance I loved it... as well as that mirror wrapped in hemp is such an ingenious idea! I saw your post and was going to come back and link up mine... I used to do a lot of tole painting before my blogging days as well as making jewelry. With blogging they have slowed down a little but I still enjoy making my own creations. I hope my post qualifies for your party. Thanks for sharing this awesome bathroom makeover and for hosting. Have a wonderful weekend!~ Poppy

    http://withadashofcolor.blogspot.com/

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  2. I love your bathroom, full of whimsy. I like the idea of using a net for a window valance, How clever! I would be happy to join your meme. Would an event like a wedding count?...Christine

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  3. hmmm that rope wrapped mirror is a great idea! I just might steal it shamelessly! lol
    I like the before.blogging.ever.existed linky party

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  4. Your bathroom is tooo cute, yep you kind of got into the one thing leads to another thing also. My bathroom showers back up to each other, so the only way to repair one is to pull out the shower wall, I don't know what they were thinking when they designed houses with no access.

    Carol

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  5. What a fun bathroom...I love your attention to detail.

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  6. Okay, you know I love this party and boy does it sneak up on me every month. I just realized I haven't add you to my blog party page and will be doing that ASAP.

    I love the boy's bathroom. So funny- my boy's bathroom was all done up in the "fishy" theme too and I swear to you that I made a frame to go around the bathroom mirror JUST LIKE YOURS! No kidding!! The magazine rack is a very clever idea! I would have never thought of it until I was tearing back the sheet rock for the second time. LOL

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  7. What an amazing room. I am totally in awe of all of your DIY projects.

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  8. This is sooooo cool. I love everything especially the mirror frame. So creative. Go girl!! Ginger :)

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  9. Wow, what a fun bathroom! I LOVE the rope frame for the mirror and all of the painted sea creatures look fantastic!

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  10. I so wish I had taken more pics before blogging. I had so many flops that would make you laugh. THis was cute though.

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  11. You are seriously the most creative person like... ever.

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  12. I missed the party! Right now I can't even remember what I did yesterday, or at least before wedding prep, much less before blogging. ;-)

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