More free or low-cost remodeling

Since we've spent all of our home equity money (and then some), any additional work on the house has to be done with the materials we have on hand. I did a lot of that this week.

First, with C. gone for the week, and a new second bathroom, I decided to tackle the first floor tub/shower. Trust me when I say that it is a good thing I did NOT take a "before" picture!

I pulled out the yucky caulk from all around the tub. G. took down the shower door. I dabbed straight bleach on all the grout (three times!) and used the steam cleaner as well. I let it dry thoroughly for several days. I used Kaboom, and soft scrub, and finally straight bleach on the tub itself. I re-caulked the tile-to-tub seam (and filled the tub with water for weight and let it sit overnight). I sealed the grout. I cleaned the shower doors (and hardware) and scraped soap scum off of them. I Rain-X'ed the inside of the shower doors. I took down the showerhead and soaked it in vinegar. G. put the doors back up. I re-caulked around them. And now it looks like this:
And I've been working on the basement bathroom for a LONG time. There used to be shelf-liner on the drywall behind the mirror. Not only that, the drywall was hung backwards (paper out) so it all ripped when I peeled the shelf-liner off. So as lousy as I am at mudding drywall, I had to mud the ENTIRE area behind the sink! While I was at it, I also mudded the seams that had been taped but never mudded (can you believe it?). And then I primed the entire room with textured paint (lousy drywaller's best friend!) and painted it with OOPS! paint we'd found at Home Depot (Behr brand) for $5 a gallon. It's a really cool green color (not sure it comes through well in pictures). Then G. found a new faucet (old one was leaking) for $9 and put that in. I stained a piece of trim to match, and G. attached that to the front of the vanity to give it a more "finished" look. I also sanded some paint off, and then used the Restor-A-Finish to touch up the vanity. We still have to hang a big mirror (we have some--just not sure how to hang them!) over the vanity and need to get some baseboard trim (that'll be real money), but the basement bathroom's looking pretty good, I think. Check it out:



We had some paint left over, so we filled in the holes on the closet doors across from the bathroom and painted them to match the bathroom:

G's got a piece of trim to put on top of those, too.

I swear, it's such an addiction to fix up the house! In some ways, it's almost more fun to have no money and try to do it anyway...