The Boys’ Bathroom

I began the renovation of our first home in the master bedroom where the former owner painted over the wallpaper, but as soon as my husband Adam began to scrape away the thick paper, chunks of plaster came crumbling down with it revealing the lath underneath. 

And so it began. 

A do-it-yourself book from the Home Depot became our bible for the next eleven years even if at times nothing written in its pages was applicable to a circa-1923 house where studs were never 24 inches apart but varied in spacing seemingly at the builder’s whim. Some even ran sideways making drywall installation seem like an Olympic sport. But Adam persevered, and after four months, the room sported Sheetrock with more seams than we could count. It never dawned on two novices that spackling and taping would cost us more in labor and time than using every little scrap of drywall. Still, these excruciating learning experiences yielded beautiful results time and again, so we battled through every room. Well, mostly Adam battled the house while I swept in to save little boys from too-good-not-to-touch power tools and a myriad of sharp objects. I mastered the art of holding a spotlight in the perfect position as Adam worked into the night so he could savor family time on the weekends. When we moved into our next home, we dove in deep and gutted the house at once. No more of this piecemeal nonsense; we had full sports schedules and countless homework projects to contend with. The only room we did not renovate was the upstairs hall bath, a mid-seventies turquoise-blue gem. To be fair, it was not in bad shape and truthfully, our budget ran out. But as the lids were hammered into the last paint can, we found out Adam had cancer. Priorities were instantly rearranged and the house took a back seat to medical treatments and what we knew was fleeting family time. But twelve years later, this Brady Bunch classic beckoned as tiles cracked and plumbing began to fail. 

Five months ago, I experienced one of the most uncertain moments of my life as I signed my name onto a contract for the renovation. Once, I relied completely on Adam’s knowledge as he guided home projects, faithfully knowing that with him at the helm, nothing would go wrong. 

As soon as the Covid-construction restrictions were lifted, my contractor showed up with a permit in hand and a dumpster ready to be plopped onto my driveway. What I anticipated as anxiety-filled weeks were anything but. How I missed seeing a room down to the studs solely because it screams “possibility.” The smell of freshly cut wood and paint was our drug of choice, one I imagine Adam and I would have sought out time and again if he didn’t get sick. Illness stifled some parts of our lives, but I never realized that it severed my creativity.

Our homes—whether a small studio, a mansion or a dorm room—whether set in a city, on a farm or on the water, embody who we are. When we thoughtfully create what surrounds us, we inevitably realize that the spaces we design have the Godly ability to make us well. 

The Dream Team

General Contractor: Robert Halasz Contracting, Madison, NJ

Tile: Chester Tile & Marble, Morristown, NJ

Faucets and bath fixtures: Frank Webb Home, Madison

Vanity: Willow Bath and Vanity