As a sort of follow up to my recent post, "Follow My Florida Dreamin'," I want to also share another way I followed a little dream to a happy trigger that keeps on giving. Specifically, my primary bathroom and bedroom. When I looked at houses in Texas for my relocation last year, I gave each house a nickname, many of which were hilarious to my realtor (and I happen to agree). There was "My Castle" which was the giant house with a turret, but when I saw it, the houses across the street put its turrets to shame and I ended up renaming it to "My Doll House" because it looked like a life size doll house. The house I really wanted was a very modern, Asian-esque model-perfect house with a pool, hot tub and backyard about which I still dream - with its pool ledge and modern appeal. But, they didn't accept my offer and it may be for the best for two reasons: the commute would have been significantly longer and more annoying (nearly impossible to avoid multiple school zones), and, I would have been incredibly reluctant to customize it and make it my own, because it was so stylish the way it was, just not exactly the styling I was considering. The house I ended up buying, I had nicknamed, "Just Ugly Enough," because it had good bones and was in a lovely neighborhood, but I absolutely hated the colors of the interior. That is actually a benefit, to me, because if I hate it, then I have no qualms about painting over it, and it was only cosmetic work that needed to be done to make my own, nothing structural or otherwise significant.
So "Just Ugly Enough" became my new home a year ago, and between work travel, personal travel, and just not wanting to unpack boxes and whatnot, it took me a little while to finally start getting my home into the style and color schemes I wanted. To be fair, there was another, more direct reason for my delay - I had mocked up several variations on my laptop, but I was nervous about the bold colors and concerned they'd be too much. Finally, I decided I just had to push forward. I was happy enough with the latest mockups, and it was just paint, right? If I absolutely hated it in a few months, I could always redo it. It would be a pain, to be sure, but, as a recent meme said, "Everything is figureoutable." 
I started slowly but with commitment - attacking first my huge, imposing fireplace with bright pink paint. I worked on it steadily but only as I had time. Even before the painting was complete, I could tell I loved it! The part of the fireplace that had been painted looked so good. I kept going. I painted the mantel and hearth a light gray to tone down the pink. When it came to the cabinets, I was thinking blue, but hadn't quite settled on the specific shade, so I taped the paint swatches of the leading contenders up to the cabinets so that I could see them in the exact light throughout the day that the actual paint would be in. I finally determined which one I liked the most and got that painting done.
Moving onto the primary bedroom and bathroom, I pretty much was set in stone on what colors I wanted in the bathroom, but again was nervous because it was, well, a lot. I struggled with what I wanted to do with my room, though, because I wanted it to match, but I also didn't want it to be too much. Weirdly, for me, I settled on painting over the ugly greyish blue with a plain white in the bedroom, and then using accents to bring the color forward - pillows and bedding, and, neon lights!! At night, which is the best time to be in a bedroom, with the neon on and the regular lights off, it has exactly the look I wanted without 
being crazy. The other thing I really liked in my room was that I ended up repurposing a tall glass cabinet that had previously been used to display movies, and I made it a display case for my various feminine accessories - necklaces and rings, my various Coach purses, and a few tokens and nicknacks. It became a functional storage in the disguise of a fashionable display case - maybe borrowing a little inspiration from the Barbie movie or the Barbie Dream House design challenge on HGTV.
The bathroom, though, is my prized room now. It is exactly right in so many ways. Prior to painting and adding wall décor, I had been collecting various accessories to match the theme I was aiming for. A fancy pink and gold picture frame that has a call bell and the caption, "Ring for Champagne" sits on the window sill next to a little bubble bath container in the shape of a bottle of champagne and a hot pink rubber duckie with the face of a flamingo, because, obviously. A silly pink hand statue, originally on top of my medicine cabinet, was 
relocated to the window sill. The corner shelving has my bath supplies - bath bombs, epson salts, shaving crème and razor, and a hot pink loofah to tie it together. On the medicine cabinet, I had these cute little pink containers for Qtips, hair ties, hair clips, swabs, etc. I found an adorable pink digital clock that I had originally placed on top of the medicine cabinets, but post-painting, it found its way to a white wall to create that contrast in color.
The problem was, all these cute hot pink accessories clashed with the baby blue wall color and the hideodeous hand stamping and those dated mirrors. It was time to paint! But that's a lot of work, so I hired someone. I put up post it notes on each wall to make it very clear which color would go where, and showed him. And thankfully, he didn't try to talk me out of the wild color design. He worked all day, but got both rooms done - so much faster than I would have! 
The wall around the bathtub is a bright turquoise, and I changed out the white sheer curtains that were there for hot pink sheer curtains (which I had bought months in advance). I had changed the color of the chandelier in my mockups, but I ended up leaving it as the white chandelier that was there because it was a good contrast to all the color. On one wall, I created an artificial "living wall" with fake plants from Hobby Lobby. On the other wall, I have a neon sign that says, "Hello Gorgeous" which is a straight shot of visibility from the toilet, a great message to see as I start my mornings. The little toilet room, although without a door to actually separate the space, just a door frame, has the same bright turquoise color.
The wall with the vanities is bright pink. Other than that, the other walls are white. The hand towels are turquoise, pulling in that color towards the pink vanity area, while the curtains pull the pink into the turquoise bath area. On the floor, bright yellow rugs of various sizes are arranged and often re-arranged by my cleaners, and honestly, the variety is kind of fun. Sometimes the long one is in front of the vanity to accommodate both sinks, other times it's by the bath tub and the wider rug is in front of my primary vanity.
The VOCs seemed to linger much longer than I anticipated, even with open windows and fans for several days. So I googled what plants were the best at absorbing CO2 and VOCs and invested in a few real living plants to help with the issue functionally, and bring some more organic décor into the space. Of course, I hate making new habits and I knew watering would be a pain for me, so I bought a few of those glass watering globes, but not just any, I bought hot pink flamingo shaped ones. I found another fun pink accessory - what looks like a little balloon 
dog, but made of hot pink transparent plastic or something similar. And now, all the hot pink décor I had bought before finally makes sense.
I toiled over what mirrors to put over the vanities - I could put the old ones back up, but I just hated how they look, even though they do sort of match the cabinets. I thought about getting really fancy ones with LED lights. But in the end, I went with a very simple, modern look of rectangular mirrors with rounded corners. I hate to drill new holes for them and install dry wall anchors - previously my nemesis for some reason, but I have no idea why, these were actually really easy to install - and once they were up, I was instantly pleased with my selection.
Not everyone likes the room - my sister especially despised it. But luckily, she doesn't have to live here. And I absolutely adore it. The motif and colors were largely inspired by my favorite trash TV show - Love Island, and honestly, after picturing it and mocking it up over and over again, I don't think it could have turned out any better. I absolutely love it. And what's more, every time I walk in there now, I get a little tingle of excitement and giddiness and joy. Whereas I would almost feel depressed walking into that blah blue bathroom before, now the colors delight me and the wall décor feels like it was always there. It's literally like seeing a dream come true, albeit another smallish dream, but a dream nonetheless.
It occurred to me that there was a book called, "Dunk Tank Pink" that had a multitude of anecdotes, including the one referenced in the title about how painting a jail cell a very specific color pink was statistically shown to calm drunk people down and reduce alcohol-fueled violence and incidents. While pink is not usually the color most people reach for to paint their bathrooms with, I wonder if part of my enjoyment is somehow related. Or, maybe I'm just embracing the feminine aesthetic being a strong, single woman. And it's not just pink. It's the whole Love Island vibe. A vibe I love!
I named my blog "Easily Thrilled" years ago because it struck me as funny or peculiar how certain inconsequential things in life could take my breath away and give me disproportionate joy. My bathroom, in the previously "Just Ugly Enough" house, in a state I don't love, is one of those things that gives me a little gush of joy every time I step into it. So my challenge, to you, dear reader, is, take the chance, buy the paint, use color unabashedly if that's what you want to do. Make it your own. Unless you're eminently selling your home, you're going to live there for a while, so don't worry about the resale value or what future buyers will think. They don't see your interior every day. You do. I'm a big believer in function over aesthetic, but once you have the function down, go big and bold with the aesthetic, the bigger and bolder, the better. So you can be easily thrilled, too.
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