Parsimonious Privy

Ten years ago when we purchased our house, this is what the guest bath looked like.

After developing an irrational fear of cabbage roses, I repainted my guest bath to look like this:

Ten years ago, I was into really bright contrasting colors like red and green, hohoho

Forget gardening.  Oh yeah, I have taken a break and moved inside.  I have started to make over my house one room at a time.  “How can I afford to do this,” you ask?  I can’t, but lucky for me I was born into something better than wealth: I was born into a family of penny-pinchers.  Or as I prefer to say, Masters of Frugality.

You know those design shows that teach you how to do a room makeover on a shoestring?  Well, after this latest project, I am thinking that I should host my own.

I haven’t quite nailed down my show’s full concept yet.   “Design on a Dime” has a $1000 budget.  (Some dime, huh?)  And there’s that other show, which duplicates a designer room using cheap materials.

Well, I think I can do any room more cheaply than any of those Design School yahoos.  It think I am going to call my show “Cheap-As-Shit Design.”

I don’t have a budget for my design projects, because my goal -- for the most part -- is to spend nothing.

I try really hard to repurpose what I already own.

O.K., but I did spend a little bit.  Here’s where:

The most expensive item is the mini dresser, for which I paid $75.  Ol’ Yeller says it cost only $50, but that’s just because that’s what I told him.  I knew that if I told him it cost $75 he would say, “I can’t believe you spent $75 on that!”

I also spent $50 to cut a thick mirror to fit the top of the dresser.

Ta-da! my new guest bath.

The third most expensive item was the candle (behind the flowers.)  It was $35, purchased for full price (I must have been under the influence of some illegal drug last time I was at Anthropologie). I bought it because it smells like Anthropologie.

Notice free Craigslist chandelier.

I spent about $40 on paint and spray paint. For some of the bath, I used paint that we already had. The sconce (for which I still need a glass cover) cost Ol’ Yeller about $5 at a garage sale years ago.

The new chandelier cost nothing more than a drive to someone’s curb.  I love Craigslist! I spray painted it silver.

I also spray painted the white switch plates silver.

I touched up the mirror, the Louis XVI painting, and some of the other fixtures with aluminum paint that Ol’ Yeller had on hand to blend in with the silver light fixtures.

In total I spent $205.

Cheap as shit!