Well this has been one of the toughest weekends ever, but it was worth it. Lisa and I installed hardwood floors in our family room. We are extremely happy (and sore) with how it came out. For this post, since we already did a How-To on hardwood floor installation last week, I thought we’d just share with you some photos of our progress.
We started this job on Friday night. We spent a good hour or so and sealed off the room with plastic from floor to ceiling. Just like the floor removal in our vestibule, we were going to make a TON of sawdust and we wanted to prevent it from going all over the house. We even covered our fireplace. We’re not interested in having small combustible particles of oak getting in there. Just not a good idea.
On Saturday we really got going. Starting at 9 am, the carpet got yanked. That removal was pretty straight forward. Luckily, I was able to enlist Lisa to help me through this whole project. Things that took awhile in the living room went quick in the family room due to her help!
We followed the same basic procedure that we used in the living room with no surprises. When you work a room of this size, it’s helpful to have two people. While I was working the staple gun, Lisa was picking out boards and placing them in rows. Plus, we had our neighbors stop by and give us a hand for a little while. Under the guise that we were showing them how to install flooring, we managed to trick them into installing a couple rows AND they helped us clean up some of our debris. Jackpot. AND, they let us borrow a sweet work light. High five!
At the end of the first day we had about half of the room done. Stopping around midnight, we were beat!! On Sunday, we got another early start and were able to finish up by 8pm. That left us a few hours to vacuum, wet swiffer and pull down tarps.
At around 10pm Sunday night, after the house had been thoroughly cleaned, we settled in for our victory beer!
On Monday, I did some quarter round molding and started to paint the walls in the family room. We’ll be posting on those projects later this week! We wanted to post for Monday, but we were so dead tired by the time we had finished the floors that it was hopeless!!
This project was exhausting! Have you ever worked a DIY project that you thought would kill you? Please share!
