What Ana Does

Long title, but now that we've gotten through a bunch of professionally-supported renovation projects, I've learned a thing or two about how to keep projects moving.  Always be there on Day 1 morning. Work from home. Take the day off. You'll need to be there to talk through the final plans, and figure out if you have all the supplies you agreed you'd gather.  Before anyone arrives, I clear out the space (that's obvious, but a big courtesy). And clear out the path to the door. And close all the doors. There will be dust. It will settle on every surface of the house. But keeping doors closed does help. I'll also write on the walls with pencil. "Tile here" "Demo out" "Outlet Here" "Keep this" -- communication is key.  Display all the plans or drawings . Some construction guys come in from other jobs and I'm sure they all get mushed together eventually. I also tape up to an adjoining wall the plan so I can point to thing...

One of my best ideas for the Girls' Bathroom Reno was to demo out the pooky closet and add a "towel nook."  The more I thought about this bathroom, the more I wanted to focus on getting everything I could out of every corner of this small space. The closet, hidden behind the door, was one of the spaces I wanted to exploit. Not the first closet I've demo'ed out of this house (you know I hate when door clash), I was happy to do away with this one.  Once I found this photo on Pinterest and knew that's exactly what I wanted to recreate the space to be.  Here's the stupid closet before. Yes, I painted it some ugly colors, but I thought it would be temporary. Also, yes, we considered enlarging the shower but the cost of moving plumbing didn't justify the job, so we kept everything the same. No regrets.  Also worth mentioning the attic access is in the ceiling of this little closet and it's nearly impossible to shimmy in and out. Even for me. So I had so...

The Girls' Bathroom Reno Project turned out better than we could have hoped!  Here's a quick summary of how it went:  It took about 12 days, 2 days over the estimated.  We only ran out of the subway tile, so I had to place a rush order on those. (I hadn't calculated in tile around the window, but once Andre suggested it, I wanted it.)  I originally was looking at glass doors for the shower, but both daughter vetoed, as they are both in the bathroom at the same time and glass doors would provide ZERO privacy. So we went with a budget-friendly shower curtain, which adds pretty texture as well as privacy. Win win!  The vanity light was a miss -- we should have put that junction box higher so we flipped the lights and they look weird. I have a new light coming.  The color pink we choose ("Rachel Pink" from SW) came out perfect. Not too Pepto Bismol and not too nursery pink. I love it. I think even Dave likes it, but he'll never admit it.  I was away in Spa...