Guest Bath $0 Update

Roundabouts a year ago (I feel like I've been saying that a lot lately, hmm...), the Guest Bathroom was near the top of my priority list. I had decorations, paint, flooring - everything all picked out and ready to go. Heck, I was ready to go, too - I was tired of the tiny, nasty bathroom, and was ready to give it a major makeover without a lot of moolah.

I painted the ceiling and all the trim, and it was looking 100x better already (it's amazing what a bit of white paint can do, isn't it?).

And then we hit a snag.

See, we both wanted to install a bi-fold door in the awkward doorway there on the left, which leads into the furnace/AC room. There's not enough room for a regular door to open/close in the small space, and so a bifold door was our solution after much consideration (we even considered a drape or curtain).

HOWEVER, because NOTHING in this house is square, level, or otherwise NORMAL, we couldn't figure out how to install a door in the HORRIBLY CROOKED frame we had to work with. We considered all sorts of options - some involving cutting down the door to fit, attaching extra wood to the sides of the frame to make it more level, and even some involved ripping apart the frame and redoing it - although we weren't sure if that would make the whole house collapse since it seems to be in a structurally important area.

So, we moved on - and completely forgot about the Guest Bath Reno.

Flash forward a year, and we've learned lots of new skills and done tons of new things - ranging from creating our own granite tile countertops to digging up a patio to our whole kitchen remodel - to installing about 30 new doors during our hallway makeover (okay, okay, so it was only like 6, but still...). We've also acquired new tools and know-how in that timeframe.

So what does that mean?

We're ready to DO THIS THING!

Starting like, yesterday.

Or a few days ago, really.

This past weekend we had some people over to celebrate my birthday (yippee!) and watch a good ole' fashioned Husker game on the tube (a big deal for us because not all the games are on public channels, and we don't have cable...). I was cleaning before the party and decided that the guest bathroom really needed SOMETHING. It was still a bit BLAH and UGH, if you know what I mean.

And I had an epiphany.

Or maybe it was more just a random inspiration.

I ran to our storage room where I found an old extra shower curtain rod that had been in there for awhile (it was either given to us or came with the house), and ran to the closet to dig out a red window curtain panel that used to hang in our living room (before we decided to go with white ones):

 Then I just put two-and-two together, and it worked perfectly!

I slipped the curtain panel onto the shower curtain rod and just propped the rod up in the back of the bathroom near the ceiling, and let the curtain panel fall over the linen closet/hidden shower opening (hahaha, read about THAT amusing story right here!).

The shower rod is white so it blends in pretty well with the walls and ceiling:

And the curtain panel fits over the opening perfectly, concealing the odd and ugly wacky area back there from view.

So while it's totally a temporary solution, it really helps the bathroom feel more, um, not craptastic. :)

And the fact that it works great for now and was 100% FREE - just makes it that much more fantastic.

So far the amount of money we've spent on this bathroom for updates: $0. Sweet.

Not too bad, eh? The plan for this weekend is to get some much-needed additional updates in this little area - so stay tuned!

What do you think of our update? Have you put two-and-two together to come up with a free update for your own casa lately? Any free finds you've snagged and remodeled - say, a dresser in the trash or a chair on Craigslist? Let's talk about free stuff!

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