(Barely) Surviving The Bathroom Wall Stenciling

 

I priced wallpaper for the bathroom.  I mean, it's small -- so how much could wallpaper be?  Shocking.  The peel and stick Magnolia brand was lovely, but would have drained valuable decorating dollars.  (Not to mention how much we hate wallpapering.)  So we chose a Mid-Century type of wall stencil.

It is only for the top half of the bathroom walls, and only on the front 2/3 of the bathroom.  But first there is always the tedious prep work.  Taking down the towel rack, medicine cabinet.  Filling in and sanding all of the groves in the wainscot paneling. Really hard😓. The prep work actually took a couple of weeks -- I could only stand to mud the walls an hour at a time. Then the sanding. Then painting on a coat of good primer to seal the plaster. 

The lower half of the bathroom is a lighter shade of gray.  

(My husband says we are doing "fifty shades of gray" in the house.)  

The top half I painted a darker shade, so that the white stenciling will really pop.

We purchased the stencil from ebay for $22.

Then the snails-pace stenciling. Attach with tape. Stencil -- dabbing a "dry" brush 1000 times.  Remove stencil.  Allow to dry.  Repeat process 25 times. Question life choices.  Like:  Why, why did I choose stenciling?