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Friday, January 4, 2013

Bathroom Update #3 ~ Painted Floor

These updates are not in the order they were completed. 
The floor was actually completed before the wainscoting (update#2).
If you follow my facebook page, you already know what the floor looks like. I will describe how I did it.


When we started this project, the floor was carpet on half and vinyl on half. I don't know about you, but I don't think carpet goes in bathrooms. It gets wet and after a period of time; smelly. UGH! This blue carpet
had obviously been there for quite some time and emitted a musty 'old' smell. I was kind of afraid of what I'd find underneath but I bravely tore it up cheered hubby on as he ripped it outta there. We (he) uncovered very hard and very brittle gold vinyl over pressed sawdust that was STUCK to the original wooden floor. (Seriously, it was particle board gone bad.) It looked very difficult to remove (I even tested my theory; it came up in tiny pieces.) so I thought I'd just save time and put a layer of plywood over top. But the more I thought about it, the more I knew it would bug me knowing I hadn't removed that old floor so I bribed and begged sweetly asked DH to help me. One Saturday he put his strong back and perseverance to work and cleaned it all out. That was no small task and I was his support 'team', keeping all the dirt swept away so he could work. When we were finished it looked like this:

 I loved the rustic look of this but because it was in a bathroom (prone to getting wet) and because there is a section under the old tub that was rotted and needed replaced, I opted to cover it up. I decided to do a 2 layer plywood floor because that got it back to the original height at the doorway. I put down a layer of economy grade 3/8" plywood and then a layer of 1/4" luan plywood. The luan is fairly smooth and needed very little sanding.
In this picture I wasn't quite finished laying the luan and you can see the layer of plywood underneath.
After laying the luan, I used a vinyl spackling and filled the screw holes and joints to make the floor mostly seamless and smooth.

I sanded this down and painted 1 coat primer and 2 coats of tan paint. (The paint I got from Menards was too pinkish when I started painting so I added some black acrylic craft paint to tone it down. Sorry, I do not know what color it ended up being.) I neglected to take a picture at this point so let's just imagine the next picture without all the tape. :)

To draw off my diamonds, I divided the room in half both ways to find the middle and began making diagonal lines. My diamonds are 12" square. After drawing them off, I used Frog delicate tape and taped off every other diamond.
A tip for getting the corners nice and square: Use a putty knife! 
Lay the knife on top the tape right along the line you want to end
your tape and give a quick yank up and back toward the knife a bit.
I found out the quicker the tug, the straighter the tape will tear.

Please note: this will take several hours to tape! 
This was my first experience with Frog tape and I will never go back!! NO bleeding! It is WELL worth the little extra money to not have to go back and touch up a million places. This is not a sponsored post; that is my honest opinion of a GREAT product!

After taping, I painted every other square with an off-white paint. (Again, something I concocted with several leftover paints I had on hand.) I marked the squares that didn't get painted with a dab of tape so I didn't get confused while I was painting.

The next step was to remove the tape. Look at those nice, crisp lines! Yay Frog tape!! :)

I really liked this look but I had intended to stencil a design on the tan squares. I laid my stencil down and did my 'envision the whole floor' trick and I began to doubt my plan. It was going to be too busy.
I made my stencil using my Silhouette Cameo and blank stencil stock from Hobby Lobby.

I posted my 'dilemma' on facebook and some of you had the great idea to do every other tan square. Well, duh. How perfect. :) I totally love it that way!

After letting my paint dry a day or so, I sealed it with a urethane floor sealer. It took me a long time to decide which sealer to use but I went with a good (read, expensive) one because it's most likely going to get wet a lot and I wanted it to hold up. I could have gone with just a polyurethane for wood but they all said they cause slight yellowing. I didn't want that! I used a product from Lowe's especially for floors: Varathane No Odor Floor Finish. I put down 4 or 5 coats and we went on vacation and let it cure. Since we have been working in there again and it has gotten HEAVY use, I will probably give it a light sanding and another coat or 2 when I'm finished everything else.

So that wraps up how I did the floor. 
If you missed my bathroom update #1 or
you can click the links of each to check them out!

The day after Christmas, DH set and hooked up the toilet so we FINALLY have a functioning toilet in there now. I can't tell you how happy I was to get that thing off my front porch! (I know, ewww, right?)

I have a few things to finish up before I show you the ceiling and how I did that. Let's just say, it involved DH's help to get it up. :)


From the Farmhouse



7 comments:

  1. It looks awesome! I can't believe the amount of work involved, and just for the floor! Talent I tell ya! :)

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  2. That is a lot of work, but it is going to be so awesome when it is finished. I know about remodeling... it "almost" is more than I can take - the mess is worse than the project itself. Great work. You inspire all of us.

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  3. Oh, how pretty!!! You have so much talent and the patience of a saint!

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  4. What Stephanie said! You amaze me.

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  5. Love, love, love it! Well worth the time! Your one talented lady.

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  7. I've been looking for a diamond painted design for our worn entryway floors and this is it! Thank you for posting the wonderful tutorial!

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Thanks for taking the time to make my day with your comments!