I’ve been meaning to write this post for quite a while now, and as you can tell, my blog could sure use the attention. I feel like there are so many interests and hobbies I have that, a. I can’t partake in nearly as often as I’d like, and b. no one knows about them. So I felt I’d share one of those hobbies with you today.

Way back last year before I started working downtown, I was living at home and trying to stay busy writing blog posts and job hunting. Literally out of boredom, I started to tear apart the half-bath at my parent’s house. I’d been watching remodeling shows on HGTV all summer, and I’m no stranger to power tools. I’d finally just gotten to the point where I couldn’t stand the awful pink wallpaper anymore, so that’s where I started.

It would be an easy, basic project. Tear off the wallpaper, do some painting, maybe add some new fixtures, and we’d have a new bathroom. If only projects in the real world actually went like that. You see, the first layer of wallpaper (yes, I said first) was on top of an even older layer of wallpaper, which was pretty much glued to the drywall. Despite perforating and soaking the wallpaper, removing the wallpaper still resulted in removing the backing paper of the drywall. Oops.

Fast forward a few weeks; the walls had been stripped down to the studs, the nearly useless insulation was removed, sink and toilet were gone, and the floors were ripped out as well. Some easy project that turned into…

Before I go any further, I had better note that I did not do this project on my own. In fact, I had some great assistance from my girlfriend Beth. And she got her hands dirty too! Helped with drywall, removing tile, painting, laying grout… probably more but that’s all I can recall at this moment.

Over the course of the entire winter (and early spring) we slowly worked on the bathroom, as schedule and budget would allow. Pretty much the only part of the project I outsourced was the mudding and taping of the drywall, a SMALL part of the plumbing, and some small electrical work. The rest was me and Beth.

The pics at various stages of the project follow. It required a lot of learning, hard work, blood, sweat and tears, but I think it turned out great.