Oh wow. All of your comments on our poor bathrooms had us laughing all day yesterday. They are sad, aren't they. Especially that master. You know, they one I use EVERY DAY. Gah. A couple more points. We like the blue tile on the floor of the guest bath too, but in case you didn't see in the comments, it really needs to go. It was improperly installed around the vanity and the radiator (which also needs to go), and, let's just say the floor isn't completely level. We love the subway tile in there too, and if I could match it, I'd just keep it. When we moved in there we're ugly frosted shower doors that we ditched in favor of a white waffle weave curtain. The problem is that we have some rough patches where the old doors attached to the wall. So, new tile all around is likely. We'll go with subway there.

And yes, Erin. That is my hair dryer in the sink. Plugged in. That's my "storage sink." Don't you have one of those? We really truly only use one of our sinks. If someone were to turn the water on in that sink it would likely sputter a bit before coming out of the faucet. Still, we know we need two sinks up there for resale value, so two sinks will go back in. I've seen vanities that have one big sink with two faucets and then a long counter alongside, but that sounds like a custom job to me, and we're going to do all of this on the pre-fab and cheap. And Sam's right. The master is dark. We have one small window that is covered by a shade for privacy, but I'm leaning to that wavy glass or frosting it so we can have the light. Also, my friend Stephanie (and others!) recommended the radiant heat, so I'm putting it firmly back on the table. So that's that. Any other questions I can answer? Anyone else want to do a mood board for me? I love those things, but I'm not good at them AT ALL. I'll sit back and await your genius!

Anyhoo....I mentioned last week that we wanted to try a new Farmer's Market, so Saturday we braved the muggy heat and headed to East Beach to check it out. I think I'll do a post sometime about this neighborhood because I absolutely lurve it, but honestly it was too hot on Saturday to do much more than grab our produce and dash! I took some pictures of a few of the houses, but to do it justice I really need to spend some time on a real walkaround.

The Farmer's Market at East Beach is small, on a lawn that is surrounded by homes, but there was plenty of bounty to choose from. I long for rows and rows of bushel baskets bursting with a bounty of produce, and while those markets do exist here they are a drive from us. You have to weigh it, I guess. The carbon offset of driving a distance for locally grown produce.

Still, I don't know. It might be worth it for a freshly picked tomato!

We came home with the blackberries and those cool purple beans. Some squash and "the best peaches" Cal has "ever tasted." When I claimed they tasted like sunshine, I was teased mercilessly, but they did.

We'll go back. More sunshine, STAT.

First, I need to explain something about life in the southern U.S. When we had dinner with our neighbors on Saturday their out of town guests mentioned this particular quirk, and it's a handy one at that. I'm going to share it with you. We're heart-blessers here. Many of you have heard this already, I know, but for those who haven't, here's a brief explanation. If we're worried about you, or we don't really like you, or something is wrong with you (you're getting my point here, yes?), we bless your heart. (And for the record, I tend to be a heart blesser regardless, but that's a story for another day, I suppose. Not sure how it came to be, but there you are.) These bathrooms? Well. Bless their hearts.

First up, our guest bath. Where to begin? This bath is in the older part of the house (There was an addition put on right as we were moving in nearly ten years ago and that's where the master is. More on that in a minute.), and there's actually still some stuff to love in this bath. A large linen closet, and see that tub? It's cast iron and original to the house (1936). Long and deep and perfect for good long soaks in the winter time. It stays.

So the bathtub stays, but everything else? Well, everything else can go. And the tub needs help. We can hire someone to refinish it for about $350, but my freind Mark tells me that they make tub refinisher that you can do yourself. Mark is the veteran for a gazillion house flips, and even though his husband did the actuall refinishing, I'm going to trust him and dig around to find that stuff. It's easier sometimes to say what you don't like rather than what you do like about things, so to wit: while I essentially like the color of the tile on the floor, say bye-bye. We're leaning black and white hexagon to jive with the period of the house. I love subway tile too, but not on all the walls. So we'll limit that to, say, just around the shower? And those fleur de lis? Yeah, bye-bye to that too.

And the vanity? Oh GAWD. That vanity. It really, really has to go, doesn't it? And even if I loveloveloved the tile, once the vanity goes, the tile goes because the vanity is tiled in. For a guest bath, especially one with a huge linen closet, we don't such a ginormous vanity. Plus it's ugly. And huge. A big, ugly vanity. Bless its heart. And the toilet? For all I know it might be originial to the house too. It rocks when you sit on it, it's impossible to clean, and when you are sitting on it, the toilet paper roll is practically sitting on your lap.

So in this bath, the vanity and toilet and all the tile go. That radiator goes too (This bathroom, much like all of our bathrooms, has no heat. Love old houses!). We'll tile around the shower, refinish the tub and replace the fixtures. Much of the work on this space we can do ourselves. Neel loves demo. We have guys we can bring in for the drywall and the tiling, and the plumbing isn't tricky here. I'd love radiant heat in the floor, but we're still negotiating that one, right honey? Really, with this bathroom, the hardest part (fingers crossed that this stays true) will be making the decisions. Neel and I saw a vanity at Lowe's on Sunday that we both really liked. It's half the size of the one we have here, has space for storage but still feels open. My only concern is that there's enough room on top to put all your stuff, like razor, meds, toothbrush, etc. Know what I mean? Still, if that's the vanity we go with, things can trickle down from there. So there you have it, bath #1. Our plan is to get started on this one sometime late August/early September.

And now, behind door number 2.

We have this gem. Our master. I honestly don't have one nice thing to say about this bathroom, bless its heart. Let's start with the basics:

So! Many! Problems! It's small and awkward. The vanity has two sinks, which we're told is a big selling point. We only use one. But we'll build in two when we redo it. Still, I hate the counter, I hate the mirror, and I hate the sconces. And I do understand the, ahem, privacy aspect of the toilet wall. However, it chops up the room, and it takes too much space. (The toilet area feels way more vast than it needs to be.) That door opens into the shower, so there's lots of juggling around each other that we have to do.

Here's the vanity in all its glory. I didn't even bother to close all the drawers! That's because the drawers don't close very well, bless their hearts. Please note the ugly tile, ungrouted, which serves for a backsplash.

And a side-by-side photo. No storage. Let me back up and tell a little story. I'll tell the whole story of buying our house one day because many parts of it were magical. But the woman who was selling it was literally hammering in the last nails of the addition as the ink was drying on the contracts. She was running out of money. She also liked to do things herself. Bless her heart. Where we have these open shelves, she had a kitchen cabinet. There are no towel racks. Little bits of quarter round are plugged in to corners where she couldn't fit the molding. And that shower? I hate it. There really are no words. It was meant to have all these shower heads that massaged you and fun things like that, but within a week of owning the house they were leaking into our kitchen which is situated below. We took them out in favor of a plain shower head. There's no storage in the shower, so my big shampoo bottles sit on the floor. The bottom of the shower feels like plastic, and the kicker? Here's my favorite part: The lowest point is not at the drain. So we have puddles.

It feels like there are bigger decisions to make here. While I'd love to add a tub, the truth is, I can always get my soak on in our guest bath. After enjoying Debbie's glorious guest bath, I'm moderately content to settle for a killer spa-like shower with glass doors and gorgeous subway tile like at my friend Debbie's house. We'd likely have the room to do a tub and shower, but perhaps not a separate tub and shower. So this rooom will need a vanity (big), shower, toilet, tile for the shower and the floor, and some kind of storage. Not to mention fixtures. Oh, and Neel? Radiant heat? We're not interested in rearranging plumbing, so everything pretty much has to go where it is right now, but surely there's more we can do here, no?

Well, Erin, Sam and Annie? What do you think? Anybody interested (although Sam gets a free pass since she has her own bathroom to do)? I'll sit back and await your moodboards. ;) Bless your hearts.

farm market {life}

a tale of two bathrooms, bless their hearts {life}