The Big (Incomplete) Reveal

So you may have wondered why I was playing rock paper scissors with my bathroom mirror.  Well, it has to do with my bathroom to-do list.  To jog your memory, this is what the cabinets over the vanity looked like before:

Ugly with a side of ugly and some ugly on top.  I started by scoring all the edges with a box cutter to keep the paint from peeling when I removed the pieces.  Then I unscrewed each shelf:

 This is where Tuesday's picture comes in to play:

See, the long shelf was held in by four screws and a lot of tension.  A lot, lot, lot of tension.  So I hammered on it with my fist, like you do.  I made pretty good progress with just a few hits on each side:

 And then realized the clips under the mirror were getting in my way.  So I took them out.  Did anyone catch what was wrong with that decision?  Oh yeah.  Those weren't just "clips under the mirror".  They were clips that kept the mirror from crashing to the ground sink.  Thankfully, the mirror shifted just a little once I took the first clip out, which made me realize: if there is nothing to hold up the mirror, it will fall on me.  Once that physics revelation made its way through my pretty little head, I lifted the mirror off of the clips and set it aside.

By the way, all that held that mirror in were two little clips.  You know, the ones that I was shaking/hitting with the shelf with every hit?  The ones that were screwed into the backboard by all of a centimeter?  So thank you, Jesus, for not allowing that mirror to crash on my face.  I know I had it coming.

Look closely; you'll see how little grip each screw had.

 Here's what I was working with after removing all the shelves and the mirror:

 Next on my hit list was the ugly scalloped trim at the top.  I wisely decided to use an actual tool for this one as opposed to my (sore) fist.  The mallet worked nicely, almost as if it were made for this!  Go figure.

 After some banging, pulling, cursing darn you-ing, and yanking, it looked like this:

 I could have done pull-ups on that sucker and it would have stayed right where it was.  If I could do a pull-up, that is.  But after a few more well placed karate chops, I was victorious:

 And it looked, if possible, even worse than before.  Let me preface this next section with a little explanation of my personality.  I am stubborn.  Adamant, bullheaded, cussed, determined.....Darn, Thesaurus.com didn't have an "e" word for stubborn.  Oh well, you get the idea. 

My grand plan was to cover the existing light fixture with a piece of trim across the front and plexiglass underneath.  I imagined it would look built-in.  I was further encouraged when I realized the shelf I had just removed was the perfect width for the job:

 I removed the scallop trim (you know, because I didn't want it to look tacky) and started beating it into submission place.  This is where things stood after about three minutes of hammering.

 At this point, I started to wonder if maybe this would look a little too imposing.  And then I distracted myself by planning dinner while I continued hammering it into place.  After I got it right where I wanted it:

 I stepped back and wondered again if it might be too big/ugly.  And then basically told myself to shut up.  So I got out the old hammer and nails:

 But before I could finish driving the first nail, Madison(who was, up to this point, playing happily with Pat) decided it was nap time.  Which meant hammering would have to wait.  I decided to shut the bathroom door and not look at the project again until it was time to get back to work.  When I came back in, I finally let myself see just how ugly my "solution" was.  Phew!  That was a close call.  If I had gotten that sucker nailed in, my laziness would have formed an alliance with my stubbornness, and I would have believed indefinitely that it looked great.

That left us with a problem:  we still had no idea how to reconstruct the area.  I quickly came to the understanding that we would have to replace the light fixture, remove the trim along the top of the cabinets, and reinstall it around the cabinets and along the back wall.  And we in that last sentence = Pat  because aside from demolition, my carpentry and electrical skills are nil.  Since the plan had originally been for this to be a Pat free project, I dreaded telling him what needed to be done.

This is the part where you see how great my guy is:  he came up with the idea on his own, knowing how much work he would have to put into it.  This is how it looks right now, after he removed the light fixture and the silly extra piece of wood it was mounted to:

And this is how it will (hopefully) look, plus a light fixture, once we are done.

You may be wondering about the mirror.  Yeah, so are we.  Right now, the plan is to glue it back on and glue some trim around it.  For now, this is where we check our appearance:

Let me tell you, if you have never checked yourself out from above a mirror, DON'T!  Gravity does not do pretty things to your face/body.  But I will also say that it's handy for checking to see if you've got any bats in the cave. 

Have you ever demolished part of your house without having a plan for putting it back together?  Do you have any suggestions for reinstalling the mirror?  Have you tempted fate with mirror safety?  Does your laziness ever threaten to join forces with your stubbornness to form an invincible foe? 

-Kelli