A New Kitchen Floor

The first room that we walked into the first time that we set foot in this house was the kitchen. It was in its full glory then, complete with pink cabinets, floral wallpaper, wood panelling and just to complete the look, carpet. No other room in the house had carpet and if you asked us then, that would have probably been the first thing we changed.

Fast forward 33 months. We are finally removing the carpet! A joyous moment that Courtney and Julia found so exciting that they decided to spend it with Grandmom and Pop! Meanwhile, Ben, Louie and I roll up our sleeves and go for it. It should be noted that the only flooring experience that the three of us have is my experiment with a 3 x 3 landing at the top of the basement stairs.

Friday was demo day. We got a later start than we thought we would, but just 45 minutes into the job we were looking at each other and trying to decide whether to go to the Shorebirds game or not. Off to the game we went. Saturday took a slightly more extended effort.

We started at 9 by laying the pad, which wasn't too bad. I think it took about 90 minutes. Ben even had time for a nap on the nice new pad. Onto the floor!

We hit the ground running and seemingly effortlessly, we're about 1/2 way done! We even lost Ben for a while when he got a fire call and had to go rescue a kitten from a tree. Louie and I kept cruising along. Then Ben returns and we get our system down.

Ben becomes the installation speciallist, I measure and cut and Louie fits right into his normal role of TOBY, helping both of us out. We're really moving now!

The complexity of the project didn't rear its ugly head until the last couple rows. To estimate I would say that those last two rows took about 3 hours! It was tough to lock in a tongue and groove system with no room to work, as we were right up against the wall. Additionally, the cuts were intricut. But we perserveered and succeeded!

Now the best part of the story. The finishing touches are done, the molding is back, we've swept up, the trash is out, the tools are put away and the stove is back in place. Now for the fridge. Wouldn't you know...it didn't fit! I didn't account for the fact that the floor was being raised.

Ben took quite a lot of joy in removing that cabinet and now, the project that I thought would be the last in the kitchen has created one more project that need to get done!

-Andy