The Home Improvement Project
That Wouldn't Die

When we first looked at our house before we bought it, we loved it. But when we walked into the family room and saw the carpet, I immediately said, "Replacing that will be our first home improvement project." Our next-door neighbors had aptly named the carpet "The Astroturf", and we thought that was quite a compliment considering the state of the rug. Five or ten projects and a full year later, we got around to it. Below is a chronology of the installation of our new floor. It is undoubtedly far more than anyone we know wants to see... but what's a web site for, if we can't relive this sort of thing here?

	The astroturf in its natural state, with our lovely vacuum cleaner as centerpiece. To the left is the fireplace. Despite the carpet, this has become our favorite room in the house. Because it's on the west side we've dubbed it "The West Wing". See a layout of the house on our house pictures page.
	On Day 1 of the project (really a Friday night), we began to rip the carpet up and found out what was underneath -- at least twenty years of whatever is able to make its way through carpet and carpet padding. It was gross. And at first we said, "Oh, we won't have to move these two couches out... we'll just work around them." Ha.
	Underneath the astroturf was so gross. In many places the old carpet padding had completely disintegrated, and underneath THAT was what was once surely considered trendy, beautiful linoleum in a red brick pattern. We began to see why the former owners never ripped the carpet up. (Did I mention it was gross?)
	Day 2: After five or six moppings of that trendy, beautiful linoleum, I took this picture of the pattern the morning sun made on my "sparkling" floor.
	Day 10: The idea behind Pergo wood floors is wonderful: a sheet of pseudo-wood that floats on top of this green squishy stuff without being glued to anything or even to itself. We laid it down in planks. Linda was in charge of sawing. I was in charge of putting the jigsaw puzzle together once she gave me the pieces. Here's the first four rows. Navigating the hearth was challenging.
	The little green tabs you can see at the edges of the floor are spacers that keep the correct distance between the floor and the wall, giving the floor room to expand with an increase in humidity. They come out after the floor is laid. Here Linda and Brandy survey the situation when it was a little more than halfway done.
	Day 82: Making it come out perfectly at the end was also challenging and involved much measuring and cutting. We were glad we bought a few more boards than we needed.
	Day 104: Linda and our friend Alicia out in the back yard at night cutting some of the last few planks. Linda saws better if I'm not around to tell her how to do it incorrectly, so I stayed inside and contemplated the results. It worked out better for everyone that way.
	Our friend Kris is about to figure out the measurements for a tricky part of the floor where the West Wing meets the foyer and the stairs. Kris and Alicia actually volunteered for this job.
	Day 263: Here's the new floor, complete except for one little piece in the upper right corner (you can see a little bit of green there). Plus we hadn't yet put in the trim where the floor meets the wall, and we hadn't put in the transition strips where the floor meets other floors.
	Kris taps the final piece into place as Linda watches from the laundry room. I stood in the kitchen to take this picture, and we all felt darn good about ourselves afterward -- not to mention each other, the house, the West Wing, Pergo, Home Depot and the floor.
	Day 349: I loved the floor. I loved the room. I loved the color of paint on the walls. But suddenly I realized that the new floor made the walls look terrible, and what this called for was a fresh coat of paint. I know you're supposed to paint before you put the floor in, but I painted anyway. Here I am putting the final touches on the front windows.
	While I was painting, Linda celebrated by making beer in the basement. This is exactly what basements were invented for. Yes, beer looks that... um... inviting when it's not yet beer.
	The brewery in the basement -- oops, I mean the kitchen in the basement -- isn't huge, but it's a great place to work if you don't want your raw beer anywhere near your new floor.

Since we finished the basic floor, we've put in trim, added an area rug and new curtain rods, and moved the furniture back in. Unfortunately we got sick of taking pictures of the floor before we did that, so if you don't live in Maryland and you want to see the finished product, you'll just have to come visit us.

Just so you know, the project actually only took us two weeks from start to finish. The laying of the floor itself only took one day, thanks to Kris and Alicia's help. It just felt like longer.

See pictures of the rest of our house here.