waiting is not my strong point. and i am learning with this budget-friendly laundry room reno, waiting is just par for the course. {click for more on day 1, day 2, and days 3-20.} the good news is the wait for flooring is over! it is finally in and we have finalized materials for the built-ins. it’s time to move on this project so our coats can stop looking like this…

budget-friendly laundry room renovation

day 21-25

day 21-22 task

{1} finalize materials once and for all {i.e. figure out the cheapest way to accomplish what i want}

day 23 task

{1} move the washer and dryer out for flooring

day 24 task

{1} flooring installation

day 25 task

{1} painting the future built-ins {my dad saved the day!}

day 21-22 {task 1}

finalize materials. i met adam yesterday to walk the hardware store aisles and go over my final materials decisions. today, i ran my final errands/shopped online to purchase the smaller items. here are my final choices ::

MDF for built-ins. this is medium density fiberboard, an engineered wood product. it paints easily {i’m planing on white}, is durable, is cheap, and comes in cuts large enough for the 15″ width i want for the built-ins.
maple hardwood for the bench and bottom shelf. MDF does not stain well and i want to stain the wood that will become the bench. ideally, this will prevent footprints from showing when my kiddos inevitable stand on this bench to reach the shelves above. i also want to stain a portion of the bottom upper shelf to use for decor instead of storage. this hardwood is more expensive than the MDF but my design vision won out over savings.
solid core 1-panel barn door. i bought our sliding barn door here from lowes. the picture at this is the correct link but the link picture shows the 5-panel door. the one i bought {in the collage pic above} has just one inset panel.
mat black steel rustic sliding barn door track. you can buy a door and track together {more expensive} or you can buy them separately {less expensive}. i found the one we used here at menards. it was by far the cheapest option.
target square bins. i decided on square bins with the following color scheme :: white with gold polka dots, aqua, navy, and coral sold here at target.
cabinets from adam. i don’t have a link for these cabinets because they came from adam’s overstock but our local hardware store had many options.
embossed costal cedar MDF wall paneling. basically, pretend shiplap. you can find this here at lowes and i plan to use it on the wall behind our coat hooks.
white ball end coat and hat hooks. you can find these here at home depot. i searched forever for hooks and i am so happy with these! especially their price! only $2.76 each. most hooks i saw were at least $4.99. i had to buy 18 hooks so at only $2.76, i figure i saved about $40 by going with a more simple design.
unfinished interior scroll bracket. the bracket/corbel i chose to divide the spaces was slightly different in design from this one but you can find the one i used in-store at lowes. the brackets were only $6.37 each. i needed six of these. i saw others that were already painted and more rustic or more interesting but they ran from $20.00 all the way to over $100.00 each! at just $6.37, i figure i saved at least $100 by going with these unfinished brackets, and painting them myself.

day 23 {task 1}

move the washer and dryer out. which means my washer and dryer are both in my family room. you will notice they don’t match. our washer is at least 10 years old. our dryer is new. i would love it if they matched but our dryer died before our washer so we’ve only replaced the dryer. my husband was out of town today. thank heavens for nice neighbors to help me lug these out of the laundry room. the flooring comes tomorrow!

speaking of flooring. you know how sometimes things don’t seem so bad until you take a step back and give them a good, hard look. well that’s how i feel about this flooring. it was functional. but ugly. i would have kept it if i could to save money {because i plan on laying a rug anyway} but next to the fresh new paint? i can’t say i am sad to say goodbye to this linoleum!

day 24 {task 1}

the floor is here! the floor is here! i have been anticipating and dreading this moment. anticipating because it means we can get this project moving. dreading because i was really worried i wouldn’t like the flooring. if you remember from day 1, we went with a fiberglass vinyl to save A LOT of money {$480!!}. but the pickings were a bit slim.

i have to say i am really pleased. i LOVE the coloring of the floor and i like the pattern a lot more than i thought i would. they laid it right over our old floor, which worried me a bit. sometimes i have trouble trusting the professionals {eye roll from my husband}.

day 25 task {task 1}

painting the wood for the built-ins. this was by FAR the hardest task. and it is still ongoing. i might have cried for a minute at the magnitude of this task. the wood was supposed to be delivered two days ago, which would have given me far more time to paint before tomorrow’s construction start date. this is another part of a reno that is hard for me. things don’t always move exactly on schedule. which i hear is normal, but flexibility is not my strongpoint!

the wood arrived today and i was supposed to start this task early this morning. but then life happened and i didn’t get to start until 2:00. when i finally began, i was overwhelmed by the work ahead of me. and by overwhelmed i mean tearing up while trying to remain calm. my husband doesn’t travel often but was out of town today. so i also had two kiddos to tend to. i vented my overwhelmedness to my sister who secretly called my dad who secretly came over to save the day. he’s like that, and often saves the day. he painted and stained in my freezing cold garage for seven hours straight! there aren’t words for this kind of help or this kind of dad. thanks to him, we were able to get more than half of the wood ready for the built-ins.

tomorrow is the big day. construction day! i cannot wait to watch our designing, planning, and savings pay off. speaking of savings…with the money we saved on hooks and brackets we are up to a total project savings of $3,865 for days 1-25 of this budget-friendly laundry room renovation! check back soon for the progress on days 26-30. {want to catch up on our budget-friendly laundry room renovation from day 1? click here. interested in what happens next? click here.}

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