Painting the bathroom faucet

(Before and After of my entire bathroom redo found here.)
UPDATE: It's  been almost nine months since I painted this faucet, and I'm delighted to say that it has held up beautifully, even with our hard water.  There are a couple tiny chips on the drain assembly, but that would be my husband's fault for prying it up with his fingernails when it got stuck once!  The faucet itself has not a scratch.

Replacing a faucet is EXPENSIVE.  And you want to make sure you get a good one...and THAT's what made me decide I'd try the paint route.
I've seen people who have painted their faucets with some success.  The biggest turn off for me (other than durability concerns) was all the precise taping.

I hate taping.

So I decided just to take out my faucet and drain assembly and spray paint them in the garage!  Thank you, YouTube.

It's a pick your poison kind of situation.  It definitely took me just as long to remove the faucet and drain assembly as it would have to tape.  But I just felt I could do a better paint job with the faucet off.

Once I had removed the faucet, I scraped off all the old caulk and cleaned it thoroughly.

Then I put on some gloves and started scuffing it up with some steel wool.  Unfortunately, the steel wool I had was super fine, so it wasn't doing the best job.  So instead I grabbed a Scotch-Brite heavy duty sponge and used that.  It did a lovely job of scuffing it up.

And then, I started spraying.  With primer.  I used some Rustoleum I had lying around from when I did our custom house numbers.  REMEMBER, folks, lots of thin coats.

Next, the oil rubbed bronze spray paint.  Krylon Brushed Metallic. 

Then I used some of the leftover Sophisticated Finishes copper metallic surfacer from my lamp redo to add some copper highlights.  I used a make-up sponge, and just lightly whisked it over the areas I wanted to highlight.

And the topcoat!  I used Krylon Matte Finish.  Again, lots of THIN coats.  Lots. I was aiming for the most durability possible.

And then it was time to put it back in.

My biggest concern with durability was cleaning it.  I don't know if it could hold up to being scrubbed.  So my solution is to prevent the problem before it starts.  I wipe the faucet and drain assembly down with a Clorox wipe every night.  So far, so good!
I love it!  And for less than 10 bucks, I'm happy!!!

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Bathroom Redo

I'm so excited to show y'all the VAST improvement of my main bathroom!
Let's get to it!

Before:

Yes, that is me in the my bathrobe with my needy daughter clinging to my legs...

After:

 
 
(I have separate posts for how to paint the faucet, how to frame the mirror, and the miscellaneous tidbits of the redo)
I took down all the hardware, the light fixture, and the shower curtain rod & rings, painted them oil-rubbed bronze and added copper highlights.  I uninstalled the faucet and drain assembly and painted that as well (and used about a million layers of top coat).  I added a beautiful frame to the plain old mirror.  I got new towels (thank you IKEA) and shower curtain, framed some 8X8 prints from my time in Eastern Europe, and, OF COURSE, painted and stenciled.


A little while ago, Cutting Edge Stencils contacted me to see if I would be interested in doing a product review and a GIVEAWAY.  Um, YES!!!  I'd been thinking of redoing that bathroom, and stenciling had crossed my mind, so this offer just sealed the deal!  After browsing all their beautiful stencils, I settled on their Paisley Allover stencil.  I kinda have a bit of a love affair with paisley.  And when I saw that GORGEOUS stencil, I couldn't resist.

Now, I did choose one of the trickiest stencils, and definitely one of the trickiest walls (I had to stencil around the shower insert, the toilet, the cabinet, the mirror, the lighting wires and mounting screw...).  But the stencil came with very clear illustrated instructions, and Cutting Edge has some terrific video tutorials:

I felt more than prepared to tackle my project!  I had it done in less than a day, and I'm thrilled with how it turned out.  Stunning, right?  :)

Giveaway closed

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And My Wedding is Scrapped...

Guess what I finished yesterday!!!  75 total pages of digitally scrapped wedding photos.  Took me about 8 days of hard core scrapping, but I made the deadline on my Groupon!  My poor neglected family.  Now that I've resurfaced, I need to clean my house and get groceries so I can feed my family!  AND I'll be finishing up my latest project, which involves that sponsor I mentioned, as well as a giveaway from them!  Be excited!

In the meantime, I just want to share some of my favorite pages from my wedding album.  Click to make them bigger!

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Resolutionary

Ah, it's that time of year.  The time when we're all feeling ambitious and waxing eloquent.  I've been trying to take a step back, and evaluate the last year and decide what I want for 2012.  And I of course have come up with some resolutions of my own.  But really, most of those goals and hopes can be summed up with my new mantra for the year: More Doing.  (Yes, it should remind you of Home Depot, I may have borrowed it.)  Actually, it was originally Doing Before Blogging, but it's about so much more than blogging.  It should really be Doing Before Wasting Time on Social Media.  And by Doing, I mean Doing What's Important.  But I digress.  The point is, there's no predicting when you'll see me on here.  I still most definitely plan on blogging, make no mistake.  But in keeping with another goal of not continually biting off more than I can chew, I'm not going to be so busy with projects that I'm an overwhelmed stress case all the time.  I will blog!  But I will not hold myself to schedules or deadlines.  In short, I'm just going to live.  And then blog as I see fit.

But anyway, I have been VERY busy, and I DO have lots to blog...including a project using products from MY VERY FIRST SPONSOR, and a GIVEAWAY from said sponsor!  So stay tuned.  And I hope you will stay around...don't give up on me!  :)

Oh yeah, one thing more...I'm on one last strict deadline.  My last Groupon for Picaboo expires on the 12th.  So I am CRANKING out a 90 page photobook of my wedding (yes, 6+ years later, I'm getting to it).  And I'm pleased as punch with the page I just finished, so I thought I'd share:

(Click to make it bigger.)

See ya soon!