i am not ashamed of the fact that i use a bathroom rug as wall decor.

so, here is a fun story.

about a month ago i was wistfully daydreaming on the anthropologie website, in the clearance section {the only place i will allow myself to look on there because why depress myself??}....something i tend to do when i have a gloomy day....and came across a bathroom rug that i immediately fell in love with.

it was bright and colorful and i knew that on another randomly gloomy day, it would be just the thing to cheer me up.  {does anyone else have this thing with space in your home?  that when you put something in it that you just love it can change your mood faster than winona ryder can say "beetlejuice, beetlejuice, beetlejuice?"  or is it just me?  i'm willing to stand alone in this, i'm just curious.}

anyway, even though it was on sale it was still a whole heck of a lot more than i would normally spend on bathroom rugs.  you know, the ones by the toilet, where little boys {and big boys, let's be honest} tend to um....miss, and spray?  or worse, but i will keep those details private.  

i usually go mucho cheapo for those rugs because they get washed a lot and wear out pretty quickly.  and who wants to see urine and fecal matter on something beautiful?  

well, that particular gloomy day let me give in to temptation and buy the rug online.  i couldn't believe i had done it, but i had.

when it showed up about a week later i opened the box and was immediately struck by the vibrance of the colors, exploding at me like rays of multi-colored sunshine bursting behind clouds.  the rug was titled appropriately, "fireworks" and i knew that even though it didn't make sense to put it where it could possibly be struck by a rainstorm of mostly-sterile-but-still-disgusting-bodily-fluids, i hugged the soft rug and whispered to it that i would never let it go.

but.

i lay it down on the floor for about a day.

and during the 24 hours it spent on the floor, i refused to walk on it and if caleb went into that particular bathroom i would roll it up off of the floor until he was finished, and then place it back down after he had left.

we just don't get nice things like this very often...and even though it was on sale i knew it would be a loooooong time before i could justify having to replace it in 6 months or so.  this is what happens you live in a destitute-like lifestyle as we have for so long.

i sat on the couch and pictured my lifetime chore of preserving the rug that way.  when guests came i could see myself opening the bathroom door and showing them the room, but as soon as they started to walk that way to provide their bladder relief, i would quickly run ahead of them... possibly throwing some elbows....shut myself quickly in the bathroom to roll up my precious fireworks rug and then emerge a moment later to allow them to do their deed.

it just wasn't going to work.

ben came home and i told him my dilemma, in my most dramatic, whatever-shall-i-do voice.  and i just may have underestimated that benjamin's brain because he came up with one of the most brilliant plans in our 8 year marriage together.  {right now it's a running tie between this current idea and the one that took place in the desert just a mere few months ago.  you be the judge.}

"why don't you just hang it on the wall?  that way you can still look at it but won't worry about people/kids/animals/random strangers you let in getting their um....poop on it?"  he said to me, half-joking.

i looked at him like he was crazy for a moment.

put a rug up on the wall?  could i do it?  no.  did i have the guts and the ability to fake trendiness in a oh-yes-we-always-hang-our-rugs-up-on-walls--doesn't everybody??--type of way??  

i doubted my abilities.

but i kept the idea in my back pocket for another day.  

and finally, after rolling up the rug about 5 more times, racing to get through the bathroom door before it closed on me, i decided to give it a go.

and i must say.  i think it works.  quite well.

and on the floor i replaced my fireworks explosion of color with a lovely $2.99 rug that looks like it belongs right where it is.  on the bathroom floor.  ready to soak in whatever comes it's way and be washed a billion times, like a sturdy champion.

here's a shot at the rest of the bathroom, if you're curious.  with little miss sassy pants discussing the meaning of life with her own reflection in the mirror.

that bennigans, i tell you what.  he has more tricks up his sleeve than i give him credit for.  anyone who chooses him as their psychologist in about 3 years is going to be oh so pleasantly surprised.

so there it is.

and i'm not ashamed that this is my wall decor.  i mean it's just a bathroom rug.  hung up on a wall.  

you should try it.  everybody who's anybody is doing it.

or at least that's what i tell myself.