I have been thinking about my downstairs bathroom lately. These thoughts kind of pop in and out of my head, there are so many things I want to do....for the most part, the "have to dos" come first. This bathroom is so small, I'm contemplating tackling it anyway. It works...the toilet flushes, the sink provides water, heck-even the door closes, which is pretty good in an old house. It's just a little ugly, not so much because of what the previous owners did, but how they did it and the fact it is undoing itself a little now. The bathroom is very small, there is a shower stall (tiled), a toilet, a pedestal sink and a window. The tile is on the walls as well, halfway up with dark brown paint on the walls above. The previous owners tried to update the look by doing a two or three step faux finish on the tiles, in a deep brown. It looks a little (and I mean a little) like stone. This was done with regular paint and is now coming off in some places. The color is......aqua! I don't know if I mean that in an excited good way or an excited horrified way; I figure there are really no period bathrooms for 1915 houses except for in the wealthiest of households. Most bathrooms in houses from this era were done in Art Deco style as that was the popular style when bathrooms moved inside. I somehow think the aqua was originated a couple of decades later. I might not mind the aqua tile if there was perhaps a contrasting color such as black...but of course this wouldn't be the case....the border tiles and entire shower stall are *pink*. To me that's just a little too much. Not only do I need to strip all the faux paint off the walls, but then I'd have to live with aqua and pink? I'm not sure I have what it takes for that......I'm starting to think this will not be a simple redecorating, but a sledgehammer job. I have uploaded some pics of the bathroom...the 1st is looking in from the door, the 2nd is our shower (with a very old multiple head set up), see the pink preview with the soap dish? The last is a closeup of the failing paint job with the aqua showing through. Any guidance would be appreciated! What would YOU do? I just wanted to brighten up my cave-like bathroom!
I live on the corner of a very busy street; it is a major east/west through way here in Tampa. When our neighborhood started out in the late teens, it was still considered a main street, but much, much smaller and nowhere near as busy (how fast could they go on a sea shell paved road?). I find the aspect of this location that bothers me the most is not the noise (except maybe the sirens), not the lack of privacy and not the street people coming up to us offering to do work for money, or just flat out asking for money; I knew all this when we bought the house. What bothers me the most here is the road dirt. If you live close enough to a busy street you may know what I mean-it's a fine, black dusty dirt which blankets everything, particularly noticeable on the front porch. We have to hose the porch off weekly, but even then, it does not completely go away. It clings to feet and travels inside, even with a door mat out front. I suspect the dirt is composed of tire/rubber dust and brake dust. It makes my white window trim black, and is a B**CH to get off, the water only moved the top layer, the rest clings. It makes it hard to enjoy the front porch, although we usually do...we just make sure we're not in our "good clothes" while we are sitting out there. I wonder how many other people are dealing with this...or maybe we are just in a "special" spot which receives the brunt of the dirt. Who knows?
Well, after being in the house just over a year, we have done a few things (new roof, repainted front porch, added a few plants, ripped up most of the remaining carpet upstairs and replaced some of the tons of rotted siding (the house was a boarding/halfway house and the termite situation was neglected for years).
At this time, we have killed off the predominantly crabgrass front yard (the side abutting Hillsborough) and installed some irrigation; we will now back fill that, measure and order sod. The other side of the front lawn is still mostly grass, so we are trying to save it...weeding, plugging and watering.
We are also getting ready to replace some majorly rotted siding around the side door facing Hillsborough, complete with it's own squirrel sized hole. We have listened to this squirrel (or rat, but I don't want to think about that possibility) grow up in our walls, from a little pitter-patter to some disturbing shuffling about, and perhaps we will feel a little bad about wrecking the habitat, but I pay taxes, the squirrel/rat does not, so I win.
I had the pleasure of consulting with Nikki Couture regarding my back yard, which, besides the bamboo, banana trees, giant bird of paradise and the big wrap around deck, is a bit pitiful right now.....full of overgrown weeds (the kind with sticky seed pods that follow you and your dogs all through the house), and lots of nothingness. Nikki has designed an easy to implement, self sustaining plan for the backyard which will be interesting, pretty and full of birds & butterflies. We will start working on a few things shortly...Thanks Nikki!
This is my first foray into blogging. I enjoy reading many blogs from my wonderful neighborhood and from people with similar interests (wood? copper piping? termites?), so I thought I might try this out. Please bear with me.....I'm a newbie! I will start posting some more info on myself, my house and my neighborhood shortly; stay tuned!
