Art = Bathroom?

Just because my hands couldn't do detail work this summer doesn't mean I wasn't busy! The culmination of several side projects will take place this coming weekend, when the tub/shower area of our bathroom is redone. Our household doesn't want anything fancy, just a tub that actually fits an adult. ;P

When it hurt too much to hold a detail brush, I could still work a paint roller and /or a foam brush. This means I've:

• Been drawing up plans for our contractor....

• Painting baseboards and wood panels to be installed...

• And painting our soon-to-be tub! Remember this bad boy that I rescued (with permission) from a friend's yard for free? (I did give her a painting as a "thank you.")

"Serenity"

10 x 8"

Acrylic on canvas

"New" feet were easy to obtain from a local antique store, but the old broken feet were an adventure unto themselves to chisel off. (Summarized version: After days of playing nice with WD40, I broke out a hammer and a screwdriver.) However, the body was in amazing shape, and refinishing a tub isn't too dissimilar from repainting my beloved Wilhelm Friedrich von Buick.

My attitude for this project was essentially "How badly can I f*** up cast iron, really?" A rather freeing thought, on the whole!

Safety first! I don't relish inhaling 1920s paint dust, nor the off-gassing from the enamel I'll be using. Oh, and our shed is now my dedicated workshop for messy, stinky craziness like this!

First (after wrestling off the old feet) came sanding and washing away years of outdoor living. I used my electric sander for the broader areas and steel wool for the detailed areas like the feet and manufacturer's information. This company became American Standard in the the 1930s. How cool is it that our tub has a birthday?!

Primer time!

Now for the first of FIVE coats of Rustoleum Topside Marine enamel. Fun fact: Both the black and the white were leftover from painting Wilhelm!

If you're wondering if five coats was necessary, I assure you, it was for this finish. SHINY!

I had hoped the inside wouldn't need redone once cleaned up, but that finish had taken a beating, too. No worries, tub, I got you!

Because good is never good enough, I added stars all around the tub, even the side that will face the wall. To give you an idea of my hand troubles, the stars took me two hours--stars should not take me, of all people, two hours. They were thankfully worth it!

Check out those gams!

This weekend, the old tub and shower surround will be torn out so that our new crown jewel can take its rightful place. Or rather, the plan is that it will only take this weekend, but we also scheduled the following weekend with our contractor as a buffer. It is our one and only bathroom, so he's going to do his darndest to limit its unavailability. (We've worked with him before, and he's ace.) He and I will be making a professional trade--his know-how and labor for a large painting--with us paying for only the remaining materials (cement board, grout, etc.) he needs to join together the tile, wood panels, and baseboards we've hoarded from Habitat Restore and elsewhere. Indeed, the remainder of my week will be making sure everything is moved out of the way, the cats are easily cordoned off (we have an interior screen door we'll install temporarily), and that I didn't forget anything on my refinishing end. Wish our household luck!

Thumbs up, indeed!