The vanity project

It's become kind of a tradition for me to ask Brian to tackle a new DIY project every year as my birthday present. This has proved to be the best way for him to give me something I'll appreciate, since (a) he hates gift shopping but rather enjoys tinkering, and (b) he doesn't generally make time for big projects unless prompted. Last year's project was painting the office; in 2016, it was installing new closet doors; in 2015, it was a knife drawer insert for the kitchen. And this year, I've officially requested a new sink, faucet, and resurfaced vanity top for the bathroom.

This bathroom vanity was one of the first things on my to-fix list back when we first bought this house. When we first saw it, the vanity was covered with laminate in a sort of faux-marble pattern, which wouldn't have been so bad if it hadn't been a dingy green shade that clashed with the lighter green fixtures and tile. Rather than replace this right away, I opted as a stopgap measure to paint over it with plain old latex paint. I used a rag-rolling technique to create a two-toned, marbleized pattern and finished it off with three coats of water-based sealant.

That worked fine, and it held up surprisingly well—so well that this "stopgap" solution ended up staying in place for the next 15 years. Of course, it was still just a painted surface, so often it suffered a little damage from water or abrasion. But for quite a few years I simply patched it up by getting out the leftover paint and dabbing it on the bare spots. It wasn't perfect, but it was still presentable.

But eventually, those minor blemishes started turning into bigger scars that were harder to conceal. So I started to put off the job of patching them, which of course meant that surface gradually started looking worse and worse. In the meantime, the sink itself was starting to show signs of wear: some cracks around the base of the faucet, some rust stains around the drain that couldn't be scrubbed off. And the faucet, which had never been great-looking, was growing more and more difficult to shut off completely. Finally I decided that this was beyond a patch job, and the whole kit and caboodle—faucet, sink, and vanity—would need to be replaced.

The question then was, how? The sink and faucet didn't pose a huge problem; we'd already tackled the job of installing new ones in the downstairs bathroom, and we were pretty sure this wouldn't be any harder. But installing a new vanity in this space would be a lot trickier than putting one up on the bare wall downstairs. The niche where the sink sits now is not a neat, rectangular space; the existing vanity top has a little divot cut out of one corner to accommodate a bump in the wall and a smaller divot cut out of another corner to fit around the door frame. So we couldn't simply buy a new vanity top the same size as the old one and squeeze it into the same space; it would have to be cut in the same places to fit exactly, which would be a very fiddly job.

Now, some years ago, I'd looked into the possibility of re-laminating our kitchen countertops (which aren't as ugly as the old bathroom vanity, but are still no treat to look at). Brian's dad talked us out of attempting this, arguing that it was an easy job to mess up and a lot more hassle than installing new countertops from scratch. But for this particular location, I thought, with its tricky shape, surely adding a new layer of laminate to the existing top would be easier—and considerably cheaper—than pulling it out and trying to cut a new one to fit in the same space. And Brian, when I put the case to him, was inclined to agree that re-laminating the existing vanity top would be more within the scope of his DIY skills than installing a whole new one.

So, about a week ago, I placed an order for four items from Home Depot:

• A 4-by-8 sheet of Formica in "Butterum Granite." This came rolled up inside a huge box; we've unrolled it and laid it out underneath a rug downstairs to try and flatten it out before we need to use it.
• A container of contact cement to attach it.
  
• A basic white drop-in bathroom sink (since I knew there was little to no chance of matching the exact green of the existing sink).
• An inexpensive single-handle faucet with a 1.2-gpm flow rate.

We haven't even received all of these yet, but already the project has hit a snag. When Brian looked at the safety information on the contact cement—which wasn't included in the description online—he discovered that in order to use it safely in our bathroom, we would not only have to open the window wide for ventilation but also turn off the heat in the house. According to the instructions, it's unsafe to use if there's an open flame anywhere in the house, including the pilot lights on the furnace and water heater. So if we used this stuff for the project, we would have to wait until spring to begin it. And even then, it would be a smelly, unpleasant, and even with the gas shut off, possibly hazardous process.

Thus, we're planning to return the unopened can of contact cement to the store and replace it with the low-VOC nonflammable version. (Sadly, this isn't available at any Home Depot or Lowe's within 100 miles of us, but we can order it from Ace Hardware.) The nontoxic version is more expensive, and it takes a much longer time to use; you have to wait about an hour before you can even stick the surfaces together, and up to seven days for a full bond. So, if we use this stuff, our upstairs sink will be out of commission for much longer than it would with the nasty version. But balanced against the risk of blowing up the house, we think that's a worthwhile tradeoff.

Sadly, having this delivered from Ace Hardware will take about a week, which means there's no chance of being able to tackle the project next weekend. And the rest of our weekends in February are so fully booked up that we probably won't get to it until the beginning of March. But that's still better than waiting until it's warm enough to go without heat, hot water, or the stove until we're 100 percent certain the cement is fully dried. And after putting off this job for 15 years already, another month won't matter all that much.