I found patches of black mold on our bathroom vanity, wall, and subfloor due to several micro leaks and needed to replace everything in the bathroom.
Which is totally fine because we hated the builder grade bathroom vanity with a passion.
I demoed, replaced and leveled the subfloor, and laid new tile. Now it’s time to update and upgrade the bathroom vanity.
To try to keep the costs down where we could, replacing the bathroom vanity lights was not in the plan. I don’t love them but I don’t completely hate them either. The plan was to try to repair the light with a socket that would not stay lit and if it can’t be fixed we replace the lights.
We need to replace the lights.
Which is fine by me because I hoped to update those Restore bargain lights in one way or another. (Actually the working light will get a little update and installed in another bathroom in our house.)
As much as I love the thrill of the hunt, my husband HATES shopping, comparison shopping in particular, with a white hot fiery passion but wants input because this is his house too. I learned early on in our relationship that the best way to satisfy both of the ways we like to work is to treat my husband as I would working with a client. I search to my heart’s desire. I present my top three (at most) selections to my husband and we make our decision together. If we can’t agree on the top three, I usually have others to chose from or I look for something that fits what we discussed.
Do I always get my number one choice? No. Does he? Also no. But more often than not, our favorite of the three is the same which makes it easy. (We also unknowingly do the same thing in restaurants.)
As a refresher, these are the bathroom vanity lights we need to replace.
Here are our top three replacement vanity wall lights.
Drum roll
I installed the Quoizel Grant Vanity Bath Light (learn more about it here)! (Disclosure: I am including affiliate links for your convenience.)
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This wall sconce is a combination of two of my favorite design styles: modern with an old world flair. I installed the sconces with the lights pointing down but if I want a new look later I can flip them to point up for a new zero dollar look.
This fixture does not include the light bulbs which is one of the things my husband and I like about it most. I bought these exact Edison light bulbs which really make these wall lights sing.
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Oh gentle reader, I will say that after a steady diet of every DIY, home renovation, and decorating TV show imaginable my sweet, simple, naive self quickly found that some basic home projects are not as simple as they appear on TV once I bought a house. My most recent big, glaring smack in the face turned out not to be easy as I thought was replacing a set of bathroom vanity lights in an hour or two.
Because I found this hiding under the old vanity lights.
Surprise! My one hour project will now take two days at the least!
There aren’t any electrical boxes installed in the wall for the wiring like there should be. I’m also pretty sure that is a crack in the fabric of space and time on the right. I better patch that before Weeping Angels, Daleks, and all sorts of bad things seep though and ruin the progress I’ve made on my bathroom renovation.
The most electrical boxes (especially when you need to hang a wall light off it) are installed by attaching the electrical box to a stud when the wall is being built. This is not the case with the wiring for my bathroom wall lights because the electricians ran the wiring in the center of the wall stud because of the plumbing for the sinks sharing that space in the framing. The builders could have installed a number of electrical boxes to work around this but apparently took the easy and possibly not building code complicate (based on a huge discussion on the Condo Blues Facebook page ) way out with bare wiring poking through a hole in the drywall.
Tsk. Tsk.
My master bathroom renovation is coming along at a good clip. We had a
leak and a little 5 minute flood in our master bathroom. Everything was just
wet enough that we had to call in remediators with giant dryers to dry out
what couldn't be removed. After they removed the vinyl flooring, they also
found batches of mold around the toilet and recommended ripping out all of the
flooring down to the joists. Which gave us an opportunity to replace
everything in the bathroom from the ground up - literally!
I found more surprises when I removed the bathroom vanityy More leaks and more mold!
Working in sections, I unscrewed the sub-flooring from the joists and used an oscillating multi tool to remove the glued flooring from the joists (you can learn more about my Rockwell Oscillating Tool that uses universal blades here which I chose the Rockwell over other brands, TBH.) (Disclosure: I am including affiliate links for your convenience.)
Once I removed the old moldy subfloor, I realized that there wasn’t anything to screw the new flooring to around the edges of the room. I can’t leave it this way or the new floor could slope over time, the tile will crack, and we’d have to start the process all over again. Trust me, once is more than enough!
I fixed the issue by using construction adhesive and screwing supports along the existing joists and around the toilet flange (this is called sistering.)
The wax ring underneath the old toilet was smashed to one side (another unknown water leak!) and the floor flange sat at angle around the plumbing. The toilet didn’t sit level and this caused one of leaks and eventually mold. I figured that possibly going overboard with sistering and adding framing in between the joists to keep the toilet level is better than taking a shortcut and regretting it later. Wood is cheap. Mistakes are expensive.
I can't tell you how tempted I was to stick a toy skeleton down there
before I covered it with plywood.
Cutting the subfloor sections to size wasn't difficult because before I removed the original subflooring I cut the tile underlayment to fit and to used the underlayment pieces as a pattern when it came time to cut the new plywood sub floor.
I filled the seams in between the sheets of sub flooring with Fix It All (you learn about this patching compound that’s made specifically for wood sub-floors here) put on my dust mask, and hand sanded the seams smooth. There were a few random spots that I couldn’t get perfectly level with sanding. I didn’t want to take a chance on the tile floor cracking over time because of it and started prepping the floor for leveling compound by using spray foam insulation to make an expansion joint around the wall of the room and as a barrier around the furnace duct and toilet flange.
Patched!
When you are suing self leveler on a wood floor it is the same technique as using self leveler on an uneven concrete floor. Only the type of products you use is different. You need to use a self leveling compound made for wood floors which requires the extra step of priming the entire floor first.
I filled all of the cracks and seams between sheets of plywood with patching
compound first. (learn more about the
Henry Pre-Mixed Floor Patch I used here
) – If there is even the tiniest sliver or gap, by its very nature the self
leveling concrete will find it and drip down into it and make a huge mess.
After the patching compound dried I applied self leveling compound primer for
wood floors (you can learn more about find
Level Pro Underlayment Primer for wood I used here) with a chip brush.
Once it was dry, it was time to don my super sexy concrete work boots and apply the leveler to the floor. This part if fairly easy (pour stuff from a bucket and push it around the room) but nerve wracking because self leveling compound has a 10 to 15 minute window before it starts to dry and is unmovable. Meaning, if you get it wrong outside of that window, it stays wrong.
Given the short working window my husband and I teamed up for this
project. He mixed the cement leveler in small batches while I poured and
worked it around the room.
Success!
Don't worry if you have swirling or color variations in the dried concrete underlayment. As long as those parts of the floor are hard, dry, solid, and level, you're ready to go to the next step in your project.
Finally it was tile time! I applied same tile underlayment and seam sealering "tape" as I used in our guest bathroom. Yes the orange stuff is more expensive than other options but it is water resistant and the fact that I can cut it on the fly with scissors or a utility knife makes it worth it in my book. You can learn more about the Schlter Ditra underlayment I used here.
Then it was time to get messy installing the tile floor and grout!
The finishing touch was using this exact spray grout sealer to seal the grout because is made for moisture laden rooms like bathrooms.
Because I never, ever, ever want to replace a moldy sub floor again.
The next step is installing the new plumbing fixtures and lighting!
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I planned to repair and reuse our bathroom vanity lights that had a wonky socket that wouldn’t stay lit for our master bathroom renovation. After shutting off the electric to the room (very important!) removing, and tinkering the light, it was a no go. I can’t fix it which means I need to replace both bathroom vanity lights.
And for added unexpected fun, I found what I’m sure is a big hole (which I suspect is crack in Space and Time) in the wall when I uninstalled the vanity lights and oh, yeah, no electrical boxes whatsoever.
Honestly, I wouldn’t mind the change. I’m more annoyed than anything because the task I thought I was going to complete in a day is now going to take much longer. It’s not a project budget buster because this is the exact reason why I always add extra money to my big project budgets. If I don’t have to use those funds for something unexpected – great! If I do, well, that’s why it’s there.
As a refresher, this is the bathroom renovation and decor plan I created.
The answer is yes.
Yes, you do.
Grout is generally made from a mix of water, sand, and cement (unless you are installing tile with small grout lines like mine which required unsanded grout.) Which means the finished product will dry with microscopic spaces in between the sand/cement and is porous. Water and liquids can seep through and cause mold and mildew on your subfloor and trust me when I say this, it is NOT a fun thing to remove and replace.
This is only one small part of the moldy bathroom subfloor I had to remove and replace. 0/10 do not recommend.
Not to mention, even when dry, if the grout is not sealed it is very easy to remove by getting it wet. That's great when you need to clean hazy tile after grouting it but not great for long term wear and tear. This is why you need to add a sealant to protect the grout from liquids and such.
Fortunately, sealing grout lines couldn't be easier. Here's how to do it.
