Paint That Funky Mirror, White Girl

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Other bathroom remodel posts:

Bye Bye Bye to 80s Tile - How To Remove Trim and Tile, Bathroom Renovation Part 1

She Only Wants Me For My Beadboard - Bathroom Renovation Part 2 

Trimming and Caulking and Painting, Oh My! - Bathroom Renovation Part 3 

When we started remodeling our bathroom, I knew from the get-go that we would be replacing the medicine cabinet mirror. My husband and I are very different heights (1 foot, 3 inches difference), so we need a large enough mirror that will allow each of us to see ourselves.

As it was, I could really only see my collar bones and up in the old mirror. That wasn't going to cut it for me. So, I was on the hunt for something better, and something that would add some more detail to the space. 

Please ignore the mis matched socket plates!

For a while, we considered doing a gilded gold framed mirror. But, over time, I realized it wouldn't quite work. We already have brown, white, and gray going on in that bathroom, and we planned to use silver for the faucet, so I didn't want to throw things off by going a completely new direction with the mirror.

I spotted this gem at Eastown Antiques and was immediately smitten. We have a large mirror above the fireplace that is a similar shape, and the stairwell stained glass window has it, too (see this post for those pictures). So, I liked the idea of pulling that shape into the upstairs.

I took it home and held it up against the beadboard, and was satisfied that it would be a good fit. Unfortunately, with the rest of our bathroom being a grey-tone white ("Satin Snow"), this cream-tone baby was going to stick out. So, I taped her up and, you know, painted her.

Once she was ready, I picked up some high-weight-bearing anchors. The fellas at ACE set me up with this guy:

We measured it out and drilled a hole in the wall, then sent the anchor through (with those wings at the bottom, folded in, going into the wall).

Then, we tightened everything up until just the right amount of hardware was poking through.

And it hung beautifully.

(Note: The trim is not nailed on behind the toilet in this picture, so the shadow looks a little bizarre)

Once the counter and faucet are swapped out, along with the beige light plate covers, we will be in good shape!

(Note: The trim is not nailed on behind the toilet in this picture, so the shadow looks a little bizarre)

Before and after:

WHAT DO YOU THINK?

• Do you like medicine cabinet mirrors for their storage?
• What would YOU have done for a mirror in this bathroom?

Bye Bye Bye to 80s Tile - Bathroom Renovation Part 1

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If you saw my upstairs house tour, you know there was one room, in particular, that needed some serious help. The upstairs bathroom, while technically functional, had been renovated (maybe in the 80s or 90s?) in a way that made it totally stand out from the rest of the house. From the fat upper trim to the pink-and-cream tile everywhere, we were determined to tackle this early on so that we could enjoy the bathroom.

Here is what we were working with at first:

For some reason, this tile simply looks dirty to me. Even after I'd given it a good old fashioned scrubbing, it had a grungy, grime-covered look to me. Not exactly what you want to see in a bathroom, where you're supposed to be getting clean.

On top of just being dirty looking, awfully colored tile, it was put everywhere. Even the countertop was tiled, which is one of my pet peeves in homes because it is so dang difficult to clean, and it's really easy to stain tile grout with makeup. They also brought this tile all the way around the walls of the room.

So, stage one of this bathroom remodel was to get rid of everything bad in the room, i.e. wall tile.

First, I removed the medicine cabinet/mirror that was hung above the sink. This was pretty simple - just a process of removing all visible screws and pulling the medicine cabinet out of the wall to reveal the lathe behind it.

The next step was to remove the trim. It had been caulked on top, so I used a box cutter to score a line in the caulk. This loosens the grip there so that the trim can be pulled off more easily.

Then, I used a chisel and hammer to get underneath the trim from above until it was a bit removed from the wall.

Occasionally, switching to a bar helped me get more leverage against the wall.

Once there was a visible gap between the trim and wall, I pulled it off with my gloves on.

We weren't sure if we were going to re-use this trim or not, so we wanted to keep it intact and orderly - just in case. I used a permanent marker to write the location of each piece on the back, to avoid confusion later on if we decided to use them.

Once the trim was off, we also removed the light plates so that we could get to the tile underneath them. Then, we got to work on the tile, itself.

We used a chisel and hammer (and occasionally the bar) to remove the tile from the wall. The chisel was placed at a very slight angle, almost flat against the wall, and pushed up against the side or top of a piece of tile. We hit the end of the chisel with a hammer until the tile pieces came loose.

Note: If you are doing this, wear gloves! Chipped tile can be very sharp, and it's easy to get cuts all over your hands, so wear some leather work gloves for protection.

The first wall (above) was fairly easy to remove the tile from. Pieces fell off easily, and some even fell off in pairs.

As we worked our way around the room, however, we ran into some problems. Whoever did this bathroom remodel (clearly quite a while ago) had done each wall a little differently.

In some areas, the "1980s remodelers" put a piece of drywall up against the plaster wall and glued the tile to the drywall. Where this was the case, the tile was ripping the drywall, but this wasn't much of an issue - we simply removed the drywall piece along with the tile, revealing the smooth, intact plaster wall behind it (see photo above).

In other places, the "1980s remodelers" skipped the drywall and simply glued the tile directly to the plaster. Where this was the case, removing the tile caused the plaster to rip and crumble, revealing the lathe behind it (see photo below, and my terrified face).

So, we ended up with a mostly clean break where there had been drywall, but one wall looked awful and would clearly need to be repaired (hmm... guess which wall?).

We considered doing this ourselves, but ended up calling someone to come help us hang and screw in the drywall. After completely botching the removal, it seemed wise to get a little help. He hung the drywall and then mudded and sanded around them to make the patching look smooth.

Next, we got started on installing what would be covering up those walls. 

What do you think it was?!

Chocolate Banana Bread (with added Protein)

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Let's be honest, we've all let produce go to waste. Some things are unsalvageable (hello, most vegetables). But other things, just like a good wine, only get better with time.

Enter bananas. I have to admit, it takes the pressure off knowing that I don't have to finish my bananas before they turn brown. I first experimented with low cal frozen banana ice cream. It's a delicious treat, and extremely creamy. But as it gets colder, I've decided to make something warm instead.

Banana bread is wonderful. There's really not much better than taking a bite of a steaming hot piece of banana bread, straight from the oven, with a tasty slab of butter melting on top. Nothing. Better.

...except maybe if you made it healthier. Say, by using whole wheat flour... adding in some protein powder... and some greek yogurt to keep it moist without dumping too much added fat indo the mix.

Ah, and I should mention that the protein powder is chocolate protein powder. So now we're not just working with banana bread, it's healthy protein chocolate banana bread. I know, chocolate was the only word you remember from that sentence. Go ahead and take a bite!

Whole Wheat Chocolate Banana Bread (with added protein)
Ingredients:
...for the bread

• 1 1/2 scoops chocolate protein powder
• 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 2 ripe bananas, mashed
• 2 egg whites
• 2 tbsp vanilla greek yogurt
• 1/3 cup oats
• Optional: 1/3 cup chocolate chips (if you want it really chocolatey - I skipped this step)

...for the topping

• 1/3 cup oats
• 2 tbsp brown sugar
• drizzling of honey
• sprinkling of cinnamon

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Mix dry bread ingredients in a medium size bowl.
3. Add bananas, egg whites, and greek yogurt, and mix well.
4. Spray a bread pan with nonstick spray, then pour mixed ingredients into the pan.
5. In the same bowl (which should now be mostly empty), mix topping ingredients with clean hands. Be sure to sprinkle enough honey into the mix so that the topping begins to stick/clump together. 
6. Sprinkle topping over the bread mix.
7. Put in the oven for 30-40 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out mostly clean (the topping will still be gooey, but the bread should be solid and clean).