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Bathroom Remodel: Hanging the Mirror & Light

Hey everyone! I just got back from spending some time in Atlanta at Haven, a blog conference for DIY bloggers. It was awesome… I met so many amazing people, learned a ton, and got to spend a few days away from my kids for the first time ever.  Other people cooked my food and cleaned up my messes….I loved it. Now I’m home and cleaning up my own messes…but I think my kids got cuter while I was gone, so it’s okay.

Before I left I had promised a post about the mirror and light in the bathroom, so here we go…

The bathroom already had a mirror but Adam and I ripped it off  to make it easier for stenciling. Then we realized that there was an extra, much larger mirror sitting in our garage… I bought a dresser off of craigslist to make into an entertainment center (which I hope to get to one day) and the mirror was just lying around, purposeless.

Dresser Mirror

(You can’t keep secrets when your taking a picture of a mirror – I’m finally painting the trim in the entryway only a year after putting it up.)

So Adam and Elijah removed it from the frame.

IMG_1688WWe could have just hung it up in the frame it was in, but we wanted the frame to match the rest of the wood in the bathroom (which is actually maple hardwood flooring).

Adam cut down the wood flooring down to the correct length, measured out where we wanted it on the wall and found the studs. Then he screwed in the bottom piece, set the mirror in it, and added the top piece, making sure at least one screw from each piece was in a stud. This held the mirror in securely, and the grooves in the flooring were perfect to hold the mirror.

Wood flooring as a mirror frame

Hanging a mirror with wood flooring

Then we took it all down and I stained and sealed the wood then put it all back up again – adding some caulk to the back to keep it from rattling.

mirror frame

Adam had put some brad nails in the frame which ended up needing to be removed, which left us with some holes that needed to be filled. Did you know that Minwax makes pre-stained wood filler? I had no idea until I stumbled across it in Home Depot a coupe weeks ago.

pre-stained wood putty

It made it easier since I had already stained the wood. It’s not perfect (since I had mixed stains), but perfection is overrated anyway.

pre-stained wood filler

Then I decided that the screws in the frame looked terrible, so Adam suggested we replace them with silver hex screws.

Silver hex screws

Genius.

DIY mirror frame using wood flooring and hex screws

(There’s that mirror again, giving away my (still pink) super messy closet secret. )

I love the hex screws though, they give it a fun industrial vibe. It looks a little rebellious…like a super friendly goth kid. I dig it.

The galvanized barn light is from Lowes and is the same one we used in the other bathroom.

galvanized light from Lowes

I know that real designers would say this is a terrible fixture for a bathroom. Bathroom vanity lights should have multiple bulbs that face upwards, so that the light bounces off the ceiling, creating less shadow and glare. Our light is the opposite of that, it’s a single beam that shines down on you and makes you look like you haven’t slept in 17 weeks. Okay it’s really not that bad, but for you gals that have (get) to wake up early for work every morning and put on makeup…it might not be the best choice.  I don’t do that, by the time I have to put on makeup for church on Sunday the sun is up and I don’t even need a light. Plus it matched the look I’m going for and is super budget friendly (you can buy it here at Lowes.com)

We had to move the light to the left to have it centered over our new vanity and mirror, which left a hole in the drywall. I’m not going to give you a hole fixing tutorial, but I did make this collage of the process which should be pretty self-explanatory.

how to patch a hole

And that’s the mirror and light, next post will be a tutorial for the subway tile…cheater style.

Dresser turned vanity

bathroom remodel - before and progress

Design

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15 Comments

  1. I love that I’m not t:he only one regularly wearing paint covered clothes. :-) I am so jealous of your bathroom! I have yet to make any improvements to mine, renting I can only do so much which means I am procrastinating because I would like to do a whole gut job in there. Oh,and children are such sponges when it comes to home improvement I enjoy seeing pictures of your boys helping.

  2. Love the hex screw idea, too. :) When I would come home from teaching last year, I’d get to work painting something and now all of my clothes have paint somewhere on them. We could make a new fashion trend with paint as the statement piece. Hah.

    1. Haha, that kid LOVES helping. He was pre-paid actually…I don’t know if you can see in the picture, but his face is covered in chocolate.

  3. Ashley,
    This bathroom is great, what a difference in the before and after pics. I love your posts and how you always “keep it real” in your pics and comments! That patch kit is pure genius, I never knew you they sold those and the way you put the pics together makes me understand how you did it perfectly. Great job!

  4. Your bathroom looks great. Can’t wait to see what you’re up to for the blanc wall above the toilet! Love your paint outfit, looks just like mine!

  5. Picture perfect! Great job you guys. Cheater subway tile…intriguing…can’t wait so hurry with that post! LOL!

  6. So smart with the extra flooring… I need to do this with a gross mirror in the guest room. :) love the stencils (they hurt my brain to do them) and OBSESSED with the lights. My fave. Looks great!!
    Xx Charlotte

  7. i LOVE the light! i did the SAME thing in our bathroom remodel! SAME light from LOWE’S! at the time, my hubby said, “is this YOUR idea? you didn’t see it on some blog? YOU SHOULD BLOG ABOUT IT!!” haha…don’t have a blog! i don’t know how you do it! i LOVE your idea of doing flooring as counter tops and how the mirror fit SO NICELY into the groove of flooring!

  8. Thanks for every other informative site. Where else could I get that kind of info written in such an ideal approach? I’ve a venture that I am just now operating on, and I’ve been on the glance out for such info.

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