it’s time for home reno! when nate and i moved in, our house was still original to 1997 when it was built. since then, we’ve (well, mostly i’ve) replaced a lot of lights, painted some walls, painted the kitchen cabinets, taken out a very 90s corner kitchen computer desk, put in a couple ceiling fans, removed a clunky medicine cabinet, etc. etc.

what remained as a big to-dos? the floors. ugh. the bedrooms have maroon and hunter green carpet. the weird dining room a beige low-pile carpet, and the kitchen vinyl linoleum. all of which were definitely end of life.

check out the very 90s gold threshold connector. that was satisfying to pull up!

but oof it’s a lot of work to replace floors. over the past week, i worked on clearing out the furniture, taking off all the floor trim, and then pulling up the carpet and padding.

nate had the last few days off, and we spent hours getting the vinyl off the floor and cleaning the concrete underneath.

on friday, nate loaded up the old carpet and we headed to cold spring to drop it off at the dump. $45 to drop off 200 lbs of gross 25-year-old carpet, which is a steal. unfortunately, something in the carpet got stuck in my arm, and i’ve had a swollen allergic reaction in my wrist and upper arm for the past couple days.

small price to pay. it’s getting better.

other mishaps?

• nate slipped on the wet concrete and biffed it.
• also realized after doing 80% of the vinyl removal that he hadn’t actually put in the blade of the floor scraper we bought (he was using the part that holds it in place). (the scraper above is actually our winter ice scraper. we bought an actual floor scraper, not pictured, with a very sharp blade. that he didn’t realize wasn’t in. this is why you read the directions.)
• the house is a mess. stuff is in the shed, the garage, the bedroom, the living room. the cats are confused and looking for a non-concrete place to place their butts.

what’s left at this point: there is one corner of carpet that goes into a closet, the linoleum under the dishwasher (waiting til the last moment to unhook the dishwasher’s very non-code electrical), and then a final cleaning of the concrete. but almost all of the concrete is smooth and ready for some floor!

i’m also going to paint the walls in the weird dining room, at least the wall on your right as you’re looking at it. it’ll be the same color as the kitchen (NOT what’s behind the stove). haven’t decided if i’ll go all the way around yet.

then it will be time to lay the new floor! liz is coming up the first weekend in august to help with her expertise and i think she’ll be here for the easy part. i have 23 boxes of flooring. i hope it’s enough.

update to come after that!