I'm so happy that I twisted the arm of my dear sweet Super Husband to participate in the One Room Challenge and give us the laundry room of our dreams.

It took eight weeks to complete, and it was HARD WORK! But it was 100% worth it.

{ Note: some of the links in this post are affiliate links which means I may earn a small fee if you purchase using this link. }

 

First, there were a few things I planned and then didn't do.

1 - we were going to do all new IKEA cabinetry and put the fridge from the garage in there. Nope! The flooring is all flagstone and 2" thick. There was no flooring under the cabinets so if we removed a few to put the fridge in we'd have needed to get some matching flagstone, have it cut so it looked original and sealed. Not a good plan.

2 - I was going to do the bottom cabinets in a green. In the end I decided the wallpaper was enough color and went with just white cabinets.

3 - I would have liked to add a skylight to the room, but someone deemed that unnecessary. Ahem. Not me.

{ after }

Next, what worked, and how it could have been made better (if it could have been made better)?

Demo. To the previous owners of our home: For Pete's sake. Do not tile a counter on top of 2 1/2" of freaking mortar. That's what we had to remove. And hammers weren't enough. Saws were brought in and poor hub had a terrible backache. He was also saying things like, "I'm too old for this shit". What could have made that easier? Ummmm... not much. It did help to break it up into squares that could be lifted. And take your time. Know demo can be rough and plan accordingly. Also, use gloves.

Cabinets. We chose to use our existing cabinets and paint them in the end. The original idea of putting the garage fridge in there didn't work because of the flooring not being under the cabinets. Unfortunately it's really thick flagstone that would have been a monster to match up. So we were S.O.L. there.

I do have a bit of advice on getting this done. It was really really hard work, but probably like having a baby. You don't remember the pain after awhile and you think, "let's do this again".

Our Best Advice When Painting Cabinets

1 - Remove the cabinets doors from the base boxes carefully marking where each cabinet door was in the room. Number them. 

2 - Remove all hardware. This next bit is SUPER IMPORTANT. When you take your cabinets off the boxes and then remove the hinges make sure you mark what size hinge was on each cabinet and where it goes. Keep a note with each piece, create a road map. Do whatever you can to keep track of where things were. Word to the wise: those hinges are all different sizes. They have little numbers on them 1/4", 1/2", 3/4" and it totally matters where those go or cabinets will not close properly etc. Putting the cabinets back was literally the hardest part of the job, but could have been made better if planned better. I was in a big rush to get it done. Some day someone is going to live here and be mumbling, "ACKERMANS!" to curse us, I'm sure.

3 - Painting. We used a HVLP power sprayer with a air compressor. An air compressor is a great thing to have if you don't have one. You can power wash things and blow up tires etc etc. This worked out great for painting, but you must really follow all of these steps:

Primer and paint should be watered down with about 10% water depending on the nozzle you use. These are the steps I followed:

• Sand down the cabinets. Some people use a de-greaser, but I didn't want to deal with the chemicals.

• Spray on primer.

• Lightly sand with 220 grit.

• Spray with paint (we used a Dunn Edwards water based latex).

• Sand lightly again.

• Spray again. This time use a lot of paint. Just enough so it's not dripping but enough to be pretty thick. The paint is designed to be self leveling. It really helped to be heavy handed.

{ Does the ugly orange detergent box bother you like it bothers me? Instead of using the detergent box, I pour our detergent in a glass jar and use a tea cup to scoop.}

The Butcher Block Tops

We ordered these from Home Depot. Don't fool yourself into thinking that you're going to miter the corners. After we got the blocks in we realized those mothers were so heavy we didn't even know how to cut them and the thought of mitering sounded just ridiculous without a professional shop. And we were very worried about the weight because we had imagined pushing them through a table saw. Silly us! The hub found out that we did not have to push the darn things through the saw, but rather, he used a straight edge jig to guide him using a circular saw rather than the table saw which would have meant pushing it through. I can't even imagine how we would have done that otherwise. It's laughable that's what we both imagined. 

To finish the butcher block we used Waterlox which is food safe. It is the laundry room so we figured it would get wet so there's four coats on it installed and we will be putting another couple coats on as well. We just ran out of time. The kitchen work started Monday and we finished Sunday. We needed the laundry room as our make shift kitchen while we are going through the renovation. Also why we did a food safe finish. It just seemed appropriate.

Wallpaper

 The English Garden wallpaper is my design for Wallternatives. It is peel and stick and was relatively easy to install. There was quite a bit of waste however due to having to match up under cabinets. This meant we had to use middle pieces. It's all worth it in the end. Be patient and don't rush

Farmhouse Sink

 We installed this farmhouse sink. It took a little figuring out, and farmhouse sinks have to have a platform to sit on in the cabinet, but there's lots of youtube videos about it.

{ My aversion to ugly packaging continues above. I put the fabric softener sheets on a cute plate and set a sachet on top. I believe that making it all pretty is helpful to mental health. No. Not kidding. }

Faucet

We ordered this matte black faucet. The one note I have from Super Husband is be sure to know where the hole for the faucet gets drilled so that the spout isn't too far forward or back. Ours ended up several inches in front of the drain which is not great, but we will live.

Washer and Dryer Surround

 This took a little planning on Super Husband's part. First we knew it had to be removable in case a machine needed fixing (which btw, it did on Sunday. The dryer broke so we had to test the plan). The two sides are flat panels with a trim piece on the fronts to hide the inside edges. They are each bolted to a lower cabinet on each side. The top is screwed to the sides. The backsplash isn't just decorative.It hides the utility stuff behind the units and assures us nothing will fall back there. That too, is removable. All we had to do to fix was unscrew and remove the butcher block.

 

Plans for Next One Room Challenge 

Next time I plan on gathering inspiration materials before the challenge weeks begin. And I won't spring it on the husband too late. I'm planning the powder room. He will freak if he hears that at the moment.

All in all we are pleased with the results, and at least I am crazy enough to do it again.