Better late than never, huh? Earlier this spring, Ron and I undertook a remodel of our guest bathroom. The room is very small-a narrow rectangle-with 1950's circa tile work throughout. Since a complete overhaul was not in our budget, we decided to do what we could to brighten and lighten the area. Fortunately, the tile is shades of gray, which is a bit easier to work with than the greens and pinks that seem to also have been popular during that time frame. I don't really have any "before" pictures, but years ago, I had stucco-ed the walls and used paint and glaze. I never really liked it, but couldn't afford to do anything to change it at the time. (here's one little corner, to give you an idea of what it was like before)
This time, Ron and I decided to put up white bead board. During this portion of the remodel, Ron and I were reminded of how different our methods of remodeling are. They say that a marriage is tested during any sort of remodeling project and I agree. There were a couple of exchanges on how to cut the boards---we were probably saying the same thing, but in different ways---before I decided this would be a project that would be better left to him and his way of thinking things through. I was there if he needed me to hold or carry boards, but otherwise I kept my distance. :-)
I turned my attention to painting the new headboard that Ron had built for me as a Christmas present. I used Annie Sloan chalk paint, added a touch of dark finishing wax to the moldings and finished it off with the Annie Sloan wax. (did I mention that Joy ate the very expensive wax brush that I had splurged on???---I ended up using an old t-shirt instead and it worked just fine).
Once the bead board was installed in the bathroom, Ron added molding at the bottom and re-installed the crown molding.
Things didn't fit exactly, so it was soon time for me to step in as chief caulker and painter.
I tried to set the camera up in the hallway to capture us working together, but the space is so tight, it was difficult. The pictures were just plain awkward, at best.
Once the paint was dry, things were looking so much better. I added some small ruffles to the existing shower curtain and we added a new light fixture.
When I was at Round Top, I looked for a few decorative accessories. Unlike some of my "antique-ing buddies", I tend to be drawn to the industrial pieces and love the idea of breathing new life into them with a touch of paint and a pair of pliers. This past week, I was finally able to tackle those projects and Ron helped me get things hung up.
**I bought the wire basket and chamber cups at Round Top and filled them with things for our guests. I'd saved the hand-stamped ribbon from a gift that Valine gave me.
***I'd also bought a piece of ceiling tile back in March. I gave one square off to give to Callie and painted the other one blue to match the ruffles on the shower curtain. I turned up the corners with pliers and used glued a metal flower to the middle (to echo the flower on the window valance).
***The window valance only needed to be hung, but finding the right kind of hardware was a bit of a challenge. I'm trying to decide whether or not paint the brackets white.
And here how it all looks now:
The shelf that is hanging on the wall was painted blue to match the tin piece.
I knew wasn't enough to cover an entire wreath, but being a bit of a tightwad, I searched for a more affordable option. I found these smaller leaves (not Magnolia, but a decent filler) for just $1.99 a branch, plus a discount. 
My splurge was on this stem of white Japanese magnolia blossoms. The actual magnolia blossoms looked too fake for me and these were a nice creamy shade.
After cutting off the magnolia leaves, I glued them to a green styrofoam ring and filled in the blank spaces with the ficus leaves.
Finally, I tucked in the blossoms, securing them with hot glue. Voila! I want to get some ivory satin ribbon to hang it, but until then, this lace ribbon will do.
