Enrolling myself in Architect School

Who here is sick of the baby posts? ME TOO!

Let's talk about how much I hate my bathroom. Shall we?

Here it is. The hateful Who Designed This Bathroom Anyway? Chimpanzees? bathroom courtesy of my mad rad Paint skillz.

You are probably wondering what J's closet is doing in our master bathroom. Answer: It is not in our bathroom. Where you see J's closet and washer/dryer, those are WALLS. As in, the bathtub is kind of set into the wall and those are the things taking up space in the corners aka Why I Have Absolutely No Storage In My Bathroom.

You are also probably wondering why there are no ACTUAL pictures of said hateful bathroom. Answer: You must be joking. That would require removal of all the hair I've lost since having the baby. GROSS.

I hate to complain. I really do. I have a very nice house, as I pointed out yesterday. The kitchen, for example, is faaaabulous. Enough counter space to hold a dance party, giant deep drawers instead of cupboards (Iove!), a big ole pantry type closet thing and more than enough room for my sparkly wine glass collection. I love the built in fireplace/bookshelves and the cool windows and the stained solid doors and even the fixtures. I live in an area where there are lots and lots of townhouses and, at least at the time when we were picking one out, ours was the best. Do I sound like a total snotbrat? It's just that there is a particular Builder who puts these things up extra fast for super cheap and ours looks nothing like those. In fact, that Builder told our builder he was taking too long on our house. Good sign, no?

ANYWAY. All that being said, there are two things I hate about the house. 1) my bathroom. 2) the closets. The size and shape of Jack's closet? THAT IS THE ACTUAL SIZE. And my closet is not much better. I think our builder opted for bigger bedrooms over closet and bathroom space, and that just goes to show that he is a MAN and therefore NOT INVESTED IN CLOSET SPACE. Before J was born Phillip ripped out all the stuff in our closet, bought a bunch of white wire closet stuff at Lowe's and redid the entire thing. I have never been happier with my not-terribly-handy husband. (He can build you a TiFaux and make sure you can print to your office printer from your laptop in a hotel room in Hong Kong, but not so much house fixy things.)

But I was talking about my bathroom. Which I hate.

I don't know if you can tell, but there is pretty much NOWHERE to put anything in my bathroom. Underneath the sink is a big cupboard. That's it. And that's where I store the cleaning things and extra toilet paper and the spare Percocet and the hairdryer attachments and boring stuff like that. But where do you put extra towels? Makeup? A decorative candle? CONTACT SOLUTION?

I've had a basket on the counter containing all these things the entire time we've lived here. Along with the hairdryer and contact solution and a mug with toothbrushes and toothpaste and Phillip's super irritating Bionic Toothbrush. There are no shelves. There is no place to put shelves. Were we to hang shelves near the toilet, we would constantly be giving ourselves black eyes if not bloody gouges in our temples. Same thing if we hung them by the sink. There is no medicine cabinet since the builder decided to line the entire wall with a giant flat mirror. There isn't even anywhere to hang a HAND TOWEL. People say, "Oh, just get one of those tall shelf things that stand over the toilet," but no! We have a WINDOW above the toilet! Gah!

What is REALLY annoying is that the bathroom has a super high ceiling. So when I was standing in there yesterday for 15 minutes because I had LOST IT with the bathroom and was going to declare WAR, I kept thinking, "If only there was a way to create storage overhead!" Except, you know, that would require a LADDER.

I decided I'd move the tall Ikea shelf thing from the guest bathroom (which is no longer a guest bathroom since we don't have guests, it's more of the Diaper Pail Bathroom), but that wouldn't fit in between the wall and the toilet in that little corner. Hate! I spent an hour online looking at narrow glass shelves and hooks and devising brilliant storage methods for the bath toys and the baskets of hair ties and lip gloss. Then I gave up, tore off all the books on my college-era Ikea bookshelf and moved the entire thing into our bathroom. I shoved it between the wall and the toilet (because it looks like my Paint skillz are just off center, but NO, the toilet is NOT IN THE MIDDLE OF THE WALL). It looks terrible. It really does. It looks very... college-era, instead of relatively new grown up house. But at least I have somewhere to stack the bath toys and the Kleenex and the bottles of lotion I can't bear to throw out, even though they are seventeen years old, because MAYBE ONE DAY I WANT TO BE TAN AND SHIMMERY!

Other townhouses have giant bathrooms with separate showers and two sinks and HEAPS of drawers and cupboard space. Of course, those other townhouses expect you to put your television over the fireplace (which I cannot STAND, it's like a SHRINE, and yes, maybe that IS how much I love my television, but I try not to ACT LIKE IT).

GAH! I am annoying today. And since I really can't go without discussing the baby, someone tell me why it is that he will not go to sleep until he has jammed himself as far into a crib rail as possible, face into the bumper, butt stuffed into the corner, and on top of all his blankets? I just went to check on him and he's breathing like Darth Vader because his nose is between the bumper and the mattress.

Comments

[Jen]

I am jealous of your kitchen! Very jealous.

I never have enough space in my bathroom to store things either. I got some of those little plastic bin things for under the sink and that helped a little, but not nearly enough.

[Tessie]

We've been looking at houses and there has been a 100% no-exceptions rule on the TV Over Fireplace thing. UCK! I do not like it! I would rather have NO fireplace and a huge blank wall for the tv!

[Jess]

I do not have any suggestions, because I would feel the same way with a bathroom like that, and one of the reasons why I love our apartment is that it was designed with tons of closet space, including a built-in shoe rack in the walk-in closet. Was it designed by a woman or what?

However, I did want to say that my fiance is exactly like your husband in terms of the techy things being much easier for him than the house fixy things. Sometimes that's good, sometimes not.

[Morgan]

Ha! I totally understand the no storage problem! We don't have much in our house and my husband forbids storage in the garage....That is where the revered Sir Kegerator resides in his spotless palace. Where am I supposed to put anything? Arrrgh.

And my daughter insists on sleeping just like your son - which means I lie awake at night, doing battle with the voices in my head that say "check on her" and then they say "but she will wake up if I do!"

[Elizabeth]

I am very jealous of your kitchen, but I am also grateful for my bathroom after reading this. What can I say? I think the two sink in one bathroom thing may have saved my marriage. And I have five drawers on my side of the bathroom alone. LOVE.
Is there a hallway outside the bathroom where you could put something for bathroom storage? We keep towels and all that biz boz in the hall closet next to the bathroom.

[Christina]

Bathrooms are wacky puzzles. We picked our house plan out ourselves, so I have no one to blame... but our bathroom does not make a good use of space. It is huge but all the space is in the middle and I have yet to figure out how to make a towel levitate. And we have the same issue with the medicine cabnets. I had no idea I had to specifically tell our builder to put them in - I thought that was sort of a basic part of the bathroom?! We have the huge wall-o-mirror too, which I hate. I'd much prefer the pretty picture-framed mirror with the secret medicine cabnet door. Sigh.

[Maureen]

You're not going to remodel your bathroom are you? ARE YOU?

DON'T DO IT!

Just keep all your stuff in a different room. It will be easier than living through a Bathroom Remodel.

I covet your kitchen.

[Nancy]

My sincere condolences on your bathroom situation. Our bathroom is a similar style (you can actually brush your teeth in the sink while still sitting on the toilet, that's how close together they are!) but your storage stinks. It sounds like you've done the best you could, considering.

Why do I always think, though, that some super-creative, Martha-type would come up with some brilliant solution, while I'm forced to inevitably resort to a college-type setup?

p.s. Am so glad to hear I'm not the only one with 3-5 outdated bottles of spray tan sitting in my bathroom!

[Lisa]

We have exactly the same problem with both of our bathrooms, since our house was built in the new "open" style called "Let's have nice enormous rooms that flow into each other, but let's sacrifice all closet and bathroom space to do it". Also with the wall-sized mirror that provides absolutely no practical function other than collecting water spots and reminding you every time you walk by how horribly dissheveled you look. We searched for weeks for the perfect solution, discovering the same thing you have with shelves. And did you know...medicine cabinets are hard to find, and those that you do find actually require you to cut INTO the wall to install them? Since both of our bathrooms border an outside wall (how stupid is that?), this would be an incredibly expensive and difficult feat. We finally resigned ourselves to storing extra towels in the baby's closet and buying this tiny little glass shelf thingy to put on the wall next to the sink, high up so we wouldn't poke an eye out, but low enough to store our assortment of hair gels and facial cleansers so they aren't falling into the sink every time we try to turn on the water. Seriously, who designs these things?

[Katie]

My personal center of hate in my house is the laundry room. It was also clearly designed by a man. It's actually the room where you enter from the garage, and there is barely enough space to squeeze in a washer and dryer. The garage entry door and the kitchen entry door hit each other if you open them at the same time. There is a closet, but it's so annoying to open because you have to deal with the two other doors in the "room" that I don't even bother. I had to put a shelf up just to be able to store some laundry supplies. Don't even think of trying to fold anything right out of the dryer in the room. HATE HATE HATE.

[el-e-e]

*pointing to you, pointing back to me*

I so relate!! I hate our bathroom too and I KNOW KNOW KNOW the dilemma of putting something--anything--that resembles a shelf in the corner by the terlet, and then having it look like college-dorm-bathroom! HATE! Have tried and removed a Pier One bookshelf in our bathroom more than once. Grrrrrr.

My dad calls that look "contemporary poverty," by the way. Ha.

also agree about the TV-over-fireplace. also have a kid who crams himself into the corner of the crib. WEIRD.