Guest Bathroom and Dry Wall Update! (alternately: We finally have a place to pee)

Disclaimer: There are no awesome before/after shots in this post... Someone asked me why I wasn't keeping up with the blog and I said "There hasn't been any photo-worthy progress lately."  I think my dear husband may have been a little (or a lot) offended, so in the interest of showing that things ARE progressing... here we go:


One of the many unknown issues we have ran into was that the plumbing was on it's way out. Like, "replace it now for cheaper or replace it later for way more money because something might burst in a wall somewhere", out. Because the Great Water Management Project (GWMP for short) and all of the tiny projects that entailed (french drain, new floors, dry well, etc) drained our budget significantly, this was a project Joe decided to take on himself.  He has a basic knowledge of plumbing, and our city has to approve any plumbing plan, so with a lot of preparation and a little YouTube, set to it.

Joe's plumbing diagram. The man is thorough!

 Because all of the old plumbing had to be ripped out, we didn't have a toilet for quite awhile.  We aren't living in the house yet, so it's not THAT big of a deal.  It does, however, get kind of tiring since when I am at the house I usually have 3 tiny bladders in tow along with a baby kicking mine, so we have become very familiar with the local restaurants and stores. (My bad, Walgreens.  You were totally being used for your potty, not your pharmacy.)  But I am excited to report that Joe got the plumbing done, which means that (drum roll please...)

We can use the bathroom in our house again!!!!  

Here is the guest bathroom before:

Guest bathroom before

Bath before

This bathroom is original to the house, but had been "updated" a little here and there along the way. The house sat empty for 6 months so mildew creeped up on a few things, like the toilet.  The subway type tile on the walls was actually a cheap plastic veneer, and chipping off badly.  There was no shower. It was only a bathtub. To complete the look, in it's very best 1970s fashion, was a carpeted floor. Nothing says luxury like carpet in the bathroom!! (Kidding....)



The bathroom was also a Jack-n-Jill style, meaning it was accessible from 2 doors, usually between 2 bedrooms.  This was the case here, but since we turned one of the bedrooms into our kitchen, we decided it wasn't SUPER practical (or sanitary) to have a bathroom directly beside the kitchen, and so it was an easy decision to close the door up.

The first step was to gut the bathroom completely, right down to the studs.  Sometimes you can save dry wall underneath the tile but apparently I'm a bit heavy handed when it comes to prying tiles off and after all the holes created by my crowbar skills, we decided to just take all the dry wall out.  I am glad we did.  Apparently a squirrel had stored acorns behind the sink at some point in the life of the house. We also discovered an active roof leak behind a wall.  Again, let me reiterate the importance of a good inspector.... Underneath the carpet were a few layers of linoleum along with some icky looking sub-floor. My dad and I (okay, mostly my dad, but I definitely helped) patched the subfloor and then installed cement board as a base for the tile.  You CAN install tile directly on sub-floor, but it is highly likely that someone at some point will want to change the flooring, and if you install tile directly on it, they will also have to rip out the sub-flooring to install something new, which is a giant hassle. Plus, like in the case of our 60 year old sub-flooring, it is 2x6 boards that may or may not be even. With tile, it is imperative your floor is even, or tile will be crooked and crack.   With cement board installed and a tile saw in hand, I set to work tiling the floor.

With that and grout complete, Joe could finally install the toilet!! There is nothing else done in the bathroom, other than a few sheets of dry wall for some privacy, but without further adieu, here is our first new toilet in the house...There is dust all over the floor and the grout still needs a good scrubbing, but we finally have a bathroom!  This does my pregnant heart (and bladder) a lot of good! We will continue to work on the bathroom and I can't wait to show you the final product! I'm ready for the picture in my head to have some life!

Now our update on getting walls... apparently City inspectors care a lot about that and how it's done and what's behind it, so it has taken awhile to get it to where it passed inspection and we are able to begin putting sheet rock on the interior perimeter of the house.

Spray foam insulation

Joe and a few awesome friends have worked through the last week or 2 trying to get the house ready for dry wall, which means insulating like crazy. We had to, per inspector, use expensive spray foam insulation on parts of the walls where the outside brick was exposed and on the rest of it, cut small rectangles of insulation to fit between the studs. Thank you to all that got fiberglass all over their being to help us!! We now have the "okay" from the city to start putting up the dry wall, so Joe has been working on that for the last couple of days. It's a slow process, but as soon as walls are up and mudded, we can start priming and painting and are THAT much closer to moving in!

Kids hanging out while we work 

 We are seriously so grateful for everyone that has helped us out so far!  Everyone should have a village, y'all... For real.

Stay tuned!  It can only get more exciting from here:)