The Fall edition of the One Room Challenge is officially underway! Follow along as I give our powder bathroom a big makeover on a small budget in 5 short weeks.
It’s the first week of the One Room Challenge and I’m super excited to be jumping in as a guest participant in the challenge this fall. I’ve had to sit the challenges out last year because we moved and had a baby, but now I’m super excited to makeover a room in our new house!
If you are unfamiliar with the One Room Challenge, the gist is that design influencers transform a room in their home in five short weeks. We all post weekly progress reports and then share our final room reveals at the end. (That room reveal day is seriously one of the best days in blogland! It’s so fun to tour all of the rooms!) The One Room Challenge happens each spring and fall and it’s always inspiring to follow along!
I officially start working on my bathroom makeover this weekend and will share the final room on reveal day, November 8, which happens to be my birthday!
This is the fourth One Room Challenge that I’ve participated in. I love doing it because it pushes me to focus on one space and make it more my style while also adding lots of function and organization. I’m highly competitive, so having the excitement of working alongside other bloggers on the same timeframe is super motivating! The challenge is not a competition, it’s just a lot of fun!
We moved into this builder house a year ago this week and had a baby a couple weeks after that, so I’ve had to be patient and focus on making over our house one small project at a time in between naptimes and commutes. Our house has a great open floor plan with plenty of space for our growing family, but the builder-grade everything leaves a lot to be desired. So I’m slowly working to banish all of the bland beige and boring fixtures from this home and infuse the place with color, character and modern style.
What To Expect
This time around, I’ll be tackling our powder bathroom! It’s on the main floor just off the kitchen and could definitely use some attention. This is a newer home, so the basics are in good shape. My goal is really to focus on cosmetic improvements over the next five weeks and make it more of our style without breaking the bank.
I will share a weekly progress update here on the blog every Wednesday or Thursday, and you can also follow real-time updates and give your input as I make design decisions over on Instagram.
So many talented designers participate in the One Room Challenge and you’ll definitely see a lot of very impressive, ambitious renovations and expensive makeovers. But that’s not at all what mine will be!
I’ll be honest, I hesitated even participating this time around because my makeover plans aren’t really all that grand. After all, I’m making over a tiny little bathroom on a shoestring budget. But my project is real life and I think very relatable for many of you. My mission with this blog is to prove that home projects don’t have to be huge and I hope this bathroom makeover will give you some practical ideas and inspire you to tackle a project in your home. Because let’s face it–not all of us have a ton of money for renovations let alone the time or skills to complete them.
Here’s what you can expect from my One Room Challenge makeover:
- Everything I do will be very budget friendly. We don’t have a lot of extra money for home projects right now, so you’ll see me investing my limited budget on a few key items while completing the rest of the room with thrifty DIY projects.
- This makeover will be done during a few hours each weekend. I work full time, have an almost-one-year-old to chase after, run this blog and manage a home. So this makeover will literally be done during the few hours I can spare on the weekends. I think many of you will relate to this, so I hope it will be fun for you to see what I can accomplish with the time I have! A lot of the challenge participants are full-time designers and bloggers that you’ll see working on their rooms for 8+ hours a day. But that’s not possible around here.
- I’m a one-woman show. My husband isn’t handy or all that interested in decorating, so besides maybe helping me hold something I will be doing all of the work myself. He has agreed to help me out by watching Chloe for a while on Saturdays so I can have some uninterrupted work time, which is a huge help!
- This will not be an over-the-top HGTV renovation. This makeover is all about cosmetic updates. While I would love to gut the bathroom and install a beautiful vanity, snazzy toilet and pretty tile flooring, that’s not in the budget nor the time frame. This won’t be an HGTV reality show, but it will be real life! Our home is newish and everything is in good condition, so I’m really just going to focus on smart, thrifty updates to make it more our style.
Plans And Inspiration For Our Bathroom Makeover
I like to gather inspiration before I begin a home project, and my Pinterest board for our powder bathroom has been filling up with tons of pretty ideas as I’ve been planning!
You can see how I use Pinterest to plan room makeovers in this blog post.
Here are some of the images that are inspiring me…
This green board and batten wall treatment is definitely happening in our bathroom. This is the image I keep coming back to as I plan out the room.
I love the idea of a clean white vanity with black hardware. I think it will be such a good contrast to the dark green walls.
And although I won’t be replacing the linoleum, I am contemplating trying out a stenciled floor. Think I should try it?
I’m still finalizing the mood board and design plans for our bathroom and will be back next week to share it all with you!
Past One Room Challenge Makeovers
While I get to work on the bathroom, I’d love for you to take a few minutes to check out the rooms I’ve tackled for past One Room Challenges in our last house!
The last challenge I participated in was a bathroom as well. I just love how bright and fresh it turned out! See more of this bathroom makeover here.
Our navy bedroom was a lot of fun and I really miss those navy walls! See more of our navy bedroom makeover here.
And my very first One Room Challenge project was my craft studio. Oh, how I miss that room! I took an ugly, empty room in our basement and turned it into an inspiring studio space. It’s a good before and after, that’s for sure! See the full craft studio makeover here.
I’ll meet you back here each week with progress updates as I work to transform our downstairs powder bathroom into a beautiful, modern space. Stay tuned for next Wednesday, when I’ll share my finalized mood board and more specifics on my plans!
Be sure to visit the One Room Challenge website for links to allllllll of the other participants!
And if you want to keep up with behind the scenes, real-time updates, be sure you’re following me on Instagram! I’ll be sharing updates in my stories as I work on the room each weekend. And I love asking my IG followers to help me select fixtures and things. They already helped me choose the paint color!
Planning your own room makeover?
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Have a great day!
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