In early January, we demolished our master bathroom. Since I don't work outside the home, we figured the four of us wouldn't have too much difficulty rotating through our one remaining full bathroom in the mornings, especially since the toddler and the preschooler get bathed at night.

Since we have prior bathroom renovation experience, we figured we'd be able to knock this one out quick – replace the old fiberglass shower/tub combo, retile the floor, install a new vanity and toilet and be done with it.

 I'm sorry, did I forget to mention it was early January, 2010?

 One whole painfully long, bathroom-sharing year later, and we finally sucked it up and paid someone to tile the shower surround and the floor. We're back in this game, baby.

 When we decided to do this, somehow we managed to forget that our first two (relatively quick and painless) bathroom renovations were started and finished before we had children. Don't get me wrong, I love my children, but my goodness, they tend to throw a wrench in the renovation works, and that's putting it mildly.

For starters, the only time we had to dedicate to the project was on the weekends, which was tough for my husband, since it was also the only extended amount of time he got with the kids all week.

Likewise, it was tough for me, since as a stay-at-home parent, I'd already been alone with them all week, and really wanted the opportunity to let someone else enjoy the experience of making a big box of macaroni and cheese and watching it go completely uneaten.

There was also the issue of having to do all the noisy stuff while they were awake, but then, naturally, the noisiest stuff ended up being the kind of stuff that one person couldn't do alone. And my husband was prohibited from doing anything except breathing during the hours of noon to 3:30pm for fear of waking them up from their naps and suffering the wrath of his wife.

 Which is why we were close to 365 days in with only a bathtub and some drywall to show for it.

 Having children changes everything, it's true. But I had no idea the ways in which it would complicate even the most basic home renovations. Every simple little step forward had to be approved by first putting it through the Child Filter: Would it be noisy? Would it be lengthy? Would it require the water to be shut off? Would it release some sort of noxious gas into the atmosphere that would result in all of us growing another ear? And perhaps most importantly, would it interfere with what precious little time we get together as a family?

 Ultimately we decided the cost savings wasn't worth the time we'd have to sacrifice. I'm totally at peace with spending money on something we technically could have done ourselves, and while I'm so glad we've got our weekend family time back, I'm equally happy that I will no longer have to share that one tiny bathroom with two people who have been known to poop in the tub.