One Woman, One Weekend, One Wonderful Home Improvement Project

Well, two posts ago I shared some pictures from the ongoing project of turning our 1905-built house into the charmer which, by virtue of its age, it has every right to be. (Don't we all?) We left off with me systematically tearing out sections of filthy old carpet and revealing a very old, very ugly, non-hardwood wood floor. This project was designated as mine, first because it's a dirty job and Paul has asthma, secondly because I hate to pile Paul with projects on his days off, (He has a very demanding job.) and thirdly because it's right up my alley; I wanted to do it.


And so, Memorial weekend happened, and happened to be the first three consecutive days off I've had in recent memory. Also, Paul would be working most of the weekend. The planets had lined up.

Saturday evening. First two rows.
Not quite clear from this picture is how
crooked the floor is along the length of
those floor boards.

In case you can't tell, I'll admit it right up front: I am feeling ridiculously accomplished and excited about this! Of all the projects we've undertaken since purchasing this house four years ago (Yes, four years. Yes, we are upside-down. Yes, we are making the best of it!) I think this has been the most dramatic. It certainly was the most difficult, at least for me, since I did it all myself...

The crooked floor combined with that little partial wall
slowed me way down! It turns out that the left wall as it continues on the other side is slightly out of square!
In short, if I had thought it through I could have forseen the impending alignment problem.

So, after some frustration, I called it a night at about 1 AM.
(The paper is my attempt to prevent dust and pet hair
from sticking to the adhesive edges of the flooring material.)

Lil' Chompy seems pleased.

Sunday afternoon between lunch and evening worship offered me a couple more quiet hours, which yielded an adequate, though not perfect, solution to my

not-quite-square-wall problem

The crooked yellow wall.

So here's where I finished on Sunday.

The mess of emptying bookshelves in order to move them is a real motivator to get the job over and done with as quickly as possible.

And then came Monday, Memorial Day, the first day I've had no reason whatsoever to leave the house since I-can't-remember-when.  Paul and I slept in until 9 or so and had a lovely morning of conversation over french toast until the time came for him to head off for work. I would have until just about 9:30 pm to complete my job! I really, really wanted it to be all finished, like a gift waiting for him, when Paul came home, exhausted, from work.  So here's how it went:

All the stuff from inside the wardrobe

Down to the last section! Just two big shelves full of books stood between me and completion.

Cutting around the floor vent was easier than I expected!

And here it is!

(We had to cover our adorable new loveseat with packing tape to keep the cats from clawing it. Not so adorable now!)

And this is what Paul saw when he came through that front door that night! We are still so excited we can hardly get over it. Tony still comments every time he walks in. For about a dollar per square foot,+ tax, (about half of what we would have spent if we paid for professional installation) we got what feels like a whole new house!

Finally, if you're curious about this flooring that's so easy to install that one woman can do it by herself without the aid of any power tools, you can check it out here.