bathroom | 2 Little Supeheroes

Found this quote on Pinterest and knew it had to be in our house somewhere. When finishing our $187 Boys Bathroom Makeover I was looking for ~~cheap~~ free artwork and thought I could somehow make this quote work as art. I considered painting it onto a canvas, but didn’t want to spend $30 on a large canvas. But I did have lots of scrap pieces of wood leftover from the board and batten I had installed in that same bathroom.

How to make your own rustic wooden sign

Cut your scrap wood pieces to the desired length (mine were different widths but that’s the look I was going for). And take 3 smaller pieces of wood for the back braces. To attach all the boards onto the back braces with the liquid nails that I was already using to attach the board and batten to the walls. Warning Be careful not to use too much glue as it will squeeze out onto the front of the boards. And this stuff does not come off! I have a few spots on mine that drive me crazy every time I look at it.

Stain the front of the boards, I used some leftover “oak” stain.

Let it dry for 24 hours and use stencils to trace the letters onto the board with a pencil. I found my stencils at A.C. Moore, and used 2 different fonts sizes (2″ Times New Roman and 1″ Times New Roman). Then the fun part- hand paint each of the letters. This took me a bit of time, but it’s a good sit-in-front-of-the t.v. kind of project.

To hang it I found 2 of these hangers and nailed them to the back.

Linking to…

This was the room in the house that we had done NOTHING with, not even pictures on the wall. I’m talking we hung a shower curtain (a necessity) and that was it.

bath1collage $187 Boys Bathroom Makeover

I was so excited to get started that I forgot to take Before pictures of the mirror. But it was just a huge plain builder grade mirror, I’m sure you’ve seen them in every single new build home in America. I had Home Depot cut some wood for me and glued it right on top of the mirror with some liquid nails (specific liquid nails for mirror). It was so easy I had my 3 year old help me! He stood on the vanity to hold the pieces in place while they dried. Not a glamorous job, but it kept him occupied for like 3 whole minutes.

I had easily pinned about a thousand board and batten pins on Pinterest . I wanted it somewhere in our house and thought that this room being the smallest in our house would be a good place to start. In our previous home we had installed board and batten in our kitchen, and I loved it. But by “we” I mean I told my brother and husband what I wanted and they just did it.

This time I was on a mission to do it myself!

There are dozens of fantastic tutorials out there, but I found the tutorial over at DecorChick to be the most similar to what I wanted and needed for my space.

I used the super thin 2″ wide battens at .66 per foot from Home Depot (found on the back wall of the store). I chose these because they were a super inexpensive way to do it, and also because I didn’t want to deal with removing the base molding. These battens matched up perfectly to our existing (thin) base molding.

The boards came in 8 foot lengths and I just had the store cut them to 4 feet lengths for me. Gotta love that. To attach to the wall I just used a couple of finishing nails and some liquid nails. I spaced the battens 12″ apart. Easy Peasy.

For the ledge I chose a 3″ batten on top. And then topped that with a 1 X 2 pine board.

The board and batten was SO EASY anyone can do it, I promise. I think it made a HUGE difference, don’t you?

I love having hooks instead of a towel bar. Bath time with a 3 year old and a 1 year old does not leave time to neatly fold and place towels on a bar! Seriously this is one of those simple changes that can make your kids nighttime routine just a little easier. I promise. And maybe one day they will actually learn to use those hooks themselves

Another big impact in this bathroom was changing the honey oak colour of the vainty, to this dark navy blue (Mariner by Martha Stewart). I also added these cabinet knobs that I found at Home Depot ($2.27 each).

Boys Bathroom Art

Two requirements here, cheap and diy.

I took 3 pictures of my boys having a bath using Instagram. I printed them out at PostalPix and the pictures were delivered right to my door. Awesome. I found frames at Michael’s and waited for a 40% off sale. Yeah I’m that cheap.

For details on the wooden superhero sign check out my Superhero diy art. I LOVE it, and it’s so appropriate for my superhero crazed boys!

This is a kids bathroom so why not have a little fun. This vinyl decal may not be everyone. But it makes me laugh. It was super simple to make with my Cricut machine. But if you aren’t lucky like me and don’t own a cricut you can also find these decals on Etsy.

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I found this poster on Etsy and fell in love with it. It was a bit of a splurge at $18 (remember I had a seriously low budget for this makeover), but I felt like I needed it the boys needed it. Brushing teeth is such a huge nightly struggle in our house, so my boys need all the reminders they can get!

As always it took me forever to pick the paint colours, but I’m totally loving both choices. And that NEVER happens. I always have paint colour remorse.

For the paint I used Martha Stewart “Driftwood Gray” MSL265 on the walls; Martha Stewart “Mariner” MSL165 on the cabinets.

Budget Breakdown

(this is a rough estimate since I completed this project pre-blog)

primer (already owned)- free

1 quart Mariner paint for cabinet $18

1 quart Driftwood Gray for walls $18

white trim paint already owned – free

all wood(I think I only needed 5 8-feet sections and I just cut them in half) was about $50 including the top trim pieces
Shower curtain already owned Bed, Bath & Beyond
Towels- Target Room Essentials Fast Dry towels $3 each (on sale normally $4 each) $9
Wood for mirror trim $20
2 tubes of liquid nails $10
finishing nails already owned – free
Etsy “Brush your teeth” poster – $18; frame already owned
“Sometimes being a Brother is even Better than being a Superhero” art – $6 for letter stencil (A.C. Moore) paint already owned and scrap wood free
3 hooks for towels $4 each Home Depot – $12
3 photos above towel hooks- Instagram photos developed $3; frames $15 (A.C. Moore)
4 cabinet knobs for vanity $2.27 each (approx $12 total)
wire basket on counter already owned – free