Buying our new home was a gigantic, bumpy, jaw-dropping, adrenaline-pumping ride. Kevin and I saw the listing of the home individually and both came to the same conclusion…we both wanted to see it. We had not said that about any home that had come on the market in a few years.
One of the reasons we wanted to see the house was because the listing said, “price reflects work that needs to be done.” It is a TOTAL fixer upper.
We dreamed up a vision immediately and went after it. How it became ours is a total God thing. (I will write about that at a later time.)
The amount of work this house needs is beyond anything we have attempted before, but we both had amazing peace about it and a longing to make it ours.
Ultimately, with any project, you will always encounter hiccups or issues that will cost more time or more money. Before we signed the papers to close on the house, we knew we needed a plan for WHEN that would happen.
We prayed and asked God about the house. We were very specific about this request, “God, what do we do when something comes up that surprises us or is not what we were expecting to happen?”
His answer surprised us. He said, “Laugh at it, because I got it.”
“Laugh at it, really? That is what you want us to do?
“Yes, I will take care of it.”
“Okay! We can do that.”
BATHROOM REMODEL-Let’s Laugh at That
We had settled into a routine in our home. Almost all of the boxes were unpacked and the bedrooms were mostly in order. We only had one fully functional bathroom and it was in the basement. Upstairs the bathrooms were all in varying degrees of functionality.
If you put the upstairs bathrooms together with what worked, one fully functioning bathroom still wouldn’t exist. But, we had a vision and a plan to make it happen.
The worst looking room in the entire house was soon to be the kid’s bathroom. Everything about it had to go.
Our plan was quickly put into action and all the items were purchased.
Kevin spent hours prepping the walls and ceiling, and getting the shower surround prepped for tiling. When it was time to start tiling, he created his CAD (computer animated design) drawing. With his plan in hand, the work began.
Once he finished tiling, he was excited to start grouting. After completing 2 walls, he took a step back and noticed something…the bullnose tile (the tile around the edge of the shower) was a different color than the wall tile.
WHAT?!?! How can this happen?
He showed me and we were both in shock. The outside tile was a shade of brown and the inside was a shade of blue. The white grout made it noticeable. It was so slight, that without the white grout it wasn’t noticeable. But, BAM…there it was.
Kevin left the bathroom and went into our living room, grabbed the TV remote, and sat down on the couch. This was not something I am used to witnessing. Kevin NEVER sits down to watch TV by himself.
I asked him what was happening.
“I am throwing a temper tantrum.”
“By watching TV?”
“Yes, I do not want to look at the bathroom right now.”
I grabbed my phone and called the store we purchased the tile from. I explained what happened. They asked me a few questions and they discovered they sold us different dye-lots. They could either pay someone to come to our house and fix it, or they could pay Kevin to fix it. They also said that they would refund all the bullnose tiles.
After I hung up the phone, we both looked at each other in shock and began to laugh.
The Lord really was taking care of it for us.
Not that he wants us to laugh at other peoples’ mistakes, but to have a light-hearted attitude towards any issue we encounter.
In the end, the tile store refunded all of our money and we have a credit for our next tile purchase because Kevin fixed it himself. We were blown away with their customer service and the Lord’s goodness.
We laughed all the way through it, with a light heart and an expectancy to see the Lord move and answer our prayers.
Not that we want anything else to go wrong with our home, but we look forward to when the time comes so we can just LAUGH AT IT…and watch the Lord provide.
Bathroom Remodel
Before and During
After
