The Last will be First and the First will be Last

The ones hired in the morning agreed to work for one denarius. The ones hired in the afternoon who worked fewer hours were still paid one denarius. There's nothing unfair about this because each individual agreed to what was arranged. Although still just as important, my title is inferring something just a bit different to Jesus's parable in Matthew.

We bought our house with three full bathrooms ranging in size from small to medium to large. The only one considered updated at the time was the small bathroom. Seven months after closing, we embarked on our first full-on DIY bathroom renovation and worked on the medium bathroom. It took us about three weeks working late nights and weekends along with our day jobs. After completing this project, this bathroom now became the nicest one in the house.

Obviously, we were still using our master bathroom. The original toilet seven years older than us and a super skinny shower door were nothing compared to the convenience of having an attached en suite.

Three and a half months ago, we made the decision to do our last and largest renovation project on the inside of our house - not completely DIY. We said goodbye to our 80's bathroom which is now remembered solely by these pictures alone:

Vanity Before

Take 2: Goodbye nasty cabinets that previous
homeowners did not take care of keeping clean

Shower: Goodbye 18 inch shower door that's
almost too skinny for a 24-inch-waisted person
to walk through straight-on

Bathtub: A very inefficiently small oval tub in a large space

And then came the fun but physically stressful part: Demolition. Last we left off, everything was boxed up and placed at the curb outside in a limited exhibition. Here's what the inside looked like.

Look at that him go with that 20 pound tool. That was no joke. 

Even just blogging about this and seeing the in-progress pictures is already making me tired again. We were thankful to have been able to move to a spare bedroom in our house and use the other bathrooms to completely clear the space so it didn't really feel like we were living through a renovation. We also had the luxury of a door to the back patio from our bedroom which the contractors used, so they stayed out of the main living area of the rest of our house so I could teach and live somewhat normally. However, I won't downplay the amount of cleaning we had to do in our bedroom and bathroom after the contractors finally finished walking in and out of our room and bathroom. There was a lot of vacuuming and a lot of mopping.

In the end, our bathroom, which ended up last to be renovated and took the most patience (in waiting for contractors to come and finish their parts) and money, is now the nicest space to bathe in our house.

New vanity with double the storage as before and a much more refreshing color scheme.

New tub - takes up just as much space as the last one, but double the bathing space
with a much more spa-like appearance and style.

We borrowed about half of the space which used to be that giant cabinet
and enlarged the shower. Frameless glass makes the shower open to the
rest of the bathroom and gives it a clean, sleek design. The door is
the proper width and built to today's code.

We haven't finished the shelves to the left of the shower yet (as you can see from the empty space in the last picture), but we're not in a rush. And having tapped out of the project halfway through due to other priorities....I'm definitely giving my husband a break on that one.

We also don't have mirrors yet because we haven't found ones that are the right size which we like. If you have any ideas, please let us know where to shop! We've scrounged Homegoods, Ross, At Home, and Kirklands.

I've also mentioned to Jonathan several times that I will not be attempting anymore large-scale DIY renovation projects around the house after this one. Not sure if it's the pregnancy stealing my energy and motivation away, or if my first-house-energy is truly drained. Either way, we will definitely be taking it easy for a LONG time in terms of house projects. However, we will not be taking it easy in terms of life for the next 18 years.....