It feels like a bit of a liberty for me to be writing this. Because although we have indeed just ‘survived’ a bathroom renovation with kids, I couldn’t honestly say we did it with any grace or style.
We ‘survived’ in the respect that we are all still alive, but apart from that, we made a lot of mistakes.
Which sucks for us, but works out quite well for you, because now I can tell you exactly what not to do so you don’t repeat the same mistakes we made!
Everyone understands that a bathroom renovation is going to be tricky. It’s the one room in the house that everybody genuinely needs to use. Several times a day. Sometimes urgently.
Almost always urgently in my case actually – I’ve had two kids, my pelvic floor is non-existent 😂
No matter how well you plan, there will always be a spanner in the works at some point, and that point usually comes after the initial “Yay we’re getting a new bathroom” excitement has worn off, and just as one of the children gets ill.
So let me take you through what we learned doing ours, and what we would do differently next time.
Second Bathroom to the Rescue?
We are luckier than some because we have an en-suite as well as a family bathroom. It was the en-suite we were getting done, but it’s quite a big one so it was a longish job. It took just under 3 weeks.
Anyway, if you have a second bathroom you might be thinking you have dodged a bullet here.
Wrong!
If you have kids, that second bathroom becomes a steamy, slippery, mouldy, chaos. There are toothbrushes everywhere, shampoo bottles on the floor, the bath mat is constantly sopping wet, and there is always someone in there. Including the builders, because they need to use it too.
You go from sharing two bathrooms between 4 people to sharing one bathroom between 6+ people.
The morning routine is horrendous. Trying to get four people ready before the workmen arrive at 8am, whilst attempting to carry on the pretence that your house isn’t absolutely disgusting, is a challenge. Then, when they turn up, you better hope no one needs a number 2. Not with strangers in the house. I would rather hold it for the entire day than have a bathroom renovator know that I just… you know 🫢
If possible, get everyone washed the night before. It’s fine for the kids, but the adults might not be up for it. And start the morning routine 10 minutes earlier. I guarantee you will still be late, but at least you will be ten minutes less late.
All that being said, at least the second bathroom was available to us. A lot of people only have one, and this is when you have to get a bit more creative.
If You Only Have One Bathroom
This was actually our second bathroom renovation. Before we had kids, we had the bathroom in our old house renovated too, and it was the only bathroom in the house.
Granted, we didn’t have to go through it with children in tow, but I do have some experience in this area as well.
There are some well known ‘hacks’ for this situation:
- Join a gym – They have showers and toilets. You don’t have to go anywhere near the exercise machines. You’re joining for shower access, not because you are training for a Hyrox. Leisure centres could work too.
- Use friends or family – Great if they live nearby, not so great if they are hundreds of miles away.
- Do your business at work – You know when they say you shouldn’t bring your work home with you? Well during the part of the renovation where there is no working toilet, don’t bring the contents of your stomach home with you either.
- Local cafes etc – Lots of small businesses have toilets for customers. So become a customer and get your money’s worth.
- Sink wash – For the kids. They’re only little, so you can put a towel down, get them to stand in the washing up bowl or something, and give them an old fashioned wash using the kitchen sink. It was good enough for your grandparents 👴👵🧼
Whatever solution you find, have it planned well before the renovation begins.
The shower might be out of action for a while but the toilet is usually only unusable for a short time – this is the most important day or two to think about. Builders should plan to leave the old toilet in place for as long as possible and fit the new one as a matter of urgency. However, renovations famously do not go to plan, so have a plan in case.
You might only be without a loo for half a day, but then again, it might be two or more days. How long can you and your kids hold it in?
General Tips
Looking back, there are several things we would have done differently. Our renovation took a week longer than expected because of missing items causing work to grind to a halt. I am at least partly to blame here, because I kept changing my mind about things late in the day 😬🤭
Anyway, here are a few practical tips for bathroom renovations:
- Plan from the ceiling down: Why? Because it’s very easy to get distracted by all the fun stuff like tiles and taps, and forget that you need an extractor fan, or that the anglebead on the window needs replacing because it is rusting through the plaster. Work from the top down, and plan every single aspect.
- Measure twice: When measuring up, do it twice. Each. Then compare. If anything is wildly off you know there is a mistake somewhere.
- Buy more than you need: This applies to tiles, paint, grout, flooring, everything. Trust me, you will be delighted to return unused boxes of tiles for a refund compared to running out at 1.30pm, having to send the builders home early, missing half a day of work to go pick up more tiles, and delay the job.
- Have everything ready before the job starts: “He won’t need that until next week”, my fella said. Turns out he was wrong. And our delivery was delayed. Cue one very angry Millie and a polite but clearly miffed bathroom fitter. Seriously, get it all delivered before the job starts and just put up with a hallway full of boxes for a week or so.
- Talk to your tradesmen: Every morning. And throughout the day if you are around. “What’s the plan for today?” “Do you have everything you need?” “I noticed you have marked the sink on the wall here, is that going to be too close to the loo?” Ask questions. Clarify and confirm. It’s much easier to adjust the height of the showerhead before it has been boarded over and tiled in than after. Trust me 😭 Don’t pester them. Just offer them a brew and chuck in a question at the same time.
- Expect delays: Even if you do everything right, expect some delays. When you start ripping rooms apart you find things you didn’t know were there. Things don’t go exactly as planned. It’s going to happen, so be ready for it: try and get on top of things at work before the job begins, don’t schedule anything important if you can help it, work from home if that’s an option so you are available to deal with things, do a massive shop the weekend before. Remove as much stress as possible from your life beforehand.
- Keep doors closed: Dust gets everywhere. EVERYWHERE. Limit how much cleaning you need to do each evening by keeping all of the doors closed. I only learned this ‘trick’ after the rip out 😒
We thought we had it all loosely planned out and that the fitters would be able to magically solve the rest. Big mistake. It’s your bathroom, so unless you have a design consultant or something, you are in charge of what goes where and how it looks.
Hopefully this helps you avoid the costly delays and the additional week of awkward bathroom sharing we had to endure. Let me know how it turns out!