Habitat for Hubanity: Basement Bathroom

When we bought our house last year, we loved that our house had two full bathrooms, but didn't love the masonite covering all of the walls in the basement bathroom. Nor did we love the cement floor in the shower in that bathroom. But as that bathroom is rarely used, we knew we could leave it alone for a time.

When my parents decided to come visit over Rhett's first birthday, we knew we couldn't expect them to wear "shower shoes" while showering, that is, unless they were showering at camp. Nor could we expect them to trek up and down the stairs just to take a shower (remember, they're OLD). When my bad memory told me the shower walls were cement as well, I thought we could just tile the shower and not worry about the masonite walls for the time being. But when Chuck reminded me that the everything was covered in masonite and that it would be nearly impossible to redo only the shower, we knew we had to (1) redo the whole thing and (2) get someone else to do it (see #1).

When sitting on the toilet in that bathroom, the wall on the left was, for lack of a better term, "squishy." This made us uncomfortable. What could be lurking on the other side of that wall? Why was it so squishy? We were scared (but not as scared as when I lived in Orem and thought a homeless man was living in my spare bathroom). And given this economy, we were afraid that if we brought in a crew that we didn't know, they'd give us a great initial estimate, but once that squishy wall was opened, well, that estimate would triple. So while it's not something we normally do, we asked a member of our ward, who does this for a living, to do it. We felt that not only would he do good work, but that he'd be honest about the squishy wall. Enter Allen.

Well, after nearly four weeks (not because it was that big of a job, but just because) we have a finished bathroom with real (!) walls (not one of which is squishy) and a beautiful shower! We love love love it and are so glad to not have to wear shower shoes.

Look at that horrible masonite!
And that shower door?! Yikes.
Understand the need for shower shoes now?


Drum roll please....