The Longest Project EVER

Meet our powder room......very oak-ey, very country, very beige. It didn't bother me for a long time. In fact, when we moved in, I was sure I would like it as-is forever.... Yeah....but after a while....
It started to look dated and boring to me. And the more I looked at it, the worse and more horrible looking it became. Then one day while I was sitting around doodling in my inspiration notebook (do you all have a notebook to jot down random ideas?) it hit me.... I needed to paint the cabinets in the bathroom.....black.....oh....and then it would need some bead board....and paint. Oh and then a new light and faucet would be required.....my fingers were flying across the paper as one idea after another came to mind. And then the clincher....I would use snowmen to decorate ALL YEAR ROUND!! WOOHOO!! Oh then the excitement just bubbled over and I began to take the before shots so I could document this glorious transformation.
I left the date stamp on them so everyone could see the actual amount of time this was taking. In the beginning I estimated being done in 2 weeks. But true to construction codes....I needed twice as much time and double the budget of the original estimates.
The black was a definite improvement. I was jazzed. But then DH left town for a few days and I was left without a right-handed-man (hahaha...because I'm left-handed....hahaha??? OK never mind). So I kept planning. I chose some paint colors for the walls.
I liked this red and considered it for my kitchen...but went with a slightly warmer red in there. So I put a big stripe of it on the wall and decided I liked it.
Next the wallpaper had to come down. Now the boarder in my laundry room came down so easy that I just assumed that this stuff would follow suit....no such luck. I am pretty certain that they used Acme Industrial Strength Wallpaper Glue to get it up on those walls. I was using language that would have made a sailor blush and ready to make a deal with the devil himself when I discovered something.....in my perfectionist ways....I was doing it all wrong. I was trying to take it down in one piece.
I was peeling a little down, squirting water on it and waiting....and peeling it down a little more, and so on. I have never really had to work at peeling this crap off the wall before...what I figured out is one must pull the front picture-water proof-mess off the paper and glue backing and spray that before any real progress can be made. WOW!! It took me an hour and a half to get one quarter of the way around this dinky little bathroom before I figured that out. The rest of the boarder came down in thirty minutes.
When Hubs got home...out came the power tools. I bought a pneumatic nailer. OOOLALA! One of those air compressor driven jobbies. I felt so like Tim "The Tool Man" Taylor at that point. So invincible.
Up went the bead board. Of course I am leaving out all the disagreeable moments of the bead board process and the less than fun time I had at the orange home improvement store. I'll just focus so hard on the positive aspects of the project that the others will just melt into the periphery.
I will admit to being in love with the instant transformation that was caused by the bead board. I loved the contrast with the green wall. I just knew that the red trim was going to look DYN-O-MITE! I was getting a little impatient. This had already taken one whole week!! We weren't even close to being finished and we had used up half of the allotted time....
The lamp had to be brought in because the light was being changed out. You know....it's a tricky thing, painting in the dark.... but.....OH!!! THE LIGHT!!!! I LURVE IT!! I got it here. They had a really good selection and it was reasonably priced.

I used trim for around the HUGE mirror and a hook instead of the strangely placed towel bar that was there. DH changed the faucet for me too. It looks great. I got it at Overstock.com. They have great faucets there for about half of what I would have payed here in town.
I have to buy longer screws for the brushed nickel knobs I bought (on e-bay) for the drawers...so they will go on later. This is about as completed as it's going to get for a while. There are just a few finishing touches before I can call it all done. I might con my friend Heather into helping me tile the floor next summer....we'll see.
For now this is it...a marked improvement, if I do say so myself....I am linking up with Met Monday at Between Naps on the Porch. Go and check out all the great projects that are linked up. I am also linking up with the Before and After party at Thrifty Decor. Such good ideas are out there!! You really should go check them out!!