I have been "not in love" with our kitchen floor since the day we found our house. We originally planned to replace it before we moved in. But a month after we bought our house, we had spent every day painting, removing wallpaper, patching walls, etc. and we decided we just wanted to move in and the floor could wait. Well, it's almost 5 years later so we decided the floor needed to go. Or Tom might say, I decided I wanted the floor replaced. So for the past month or so we've spent tons of time at wood floor places trying to decide on what we wanted. Tom had taken some time off work and the project began. First, here's the before pictures.
First, here's my disclaimer. When we first talked about doing this I told Tom I wanted to hire someone to do it. If you know Tom you know that he wants to do everything himself. Mostly for money sake. He just can't see spending extra money on something he can do himself. And luckily for me, he's pretty good at figuring things out and knows how to do a lot of things. But as the project got closer and we talked about it more Tom informed me that he would be doing this project. And so it was. Tom started by just ripping up this linoleum and then there was a layer of plywood under that that had to be pryed up and the staples removed. That was more of a project than I imagined and it kicked up quite a bit of dust.
The kids were good helpers and actually really helped quite a bit during this part.
That was until Zac stepped on one of the staples sticking out of a pryed up piece of wood. After quite a bit of crying, blood and a call to doctor's office to make sure he had his tetanus shot Tom was back to work.
We got the floor out but then the linoleum and plywood ran underneath all the cabinets. So they needed to come out too. We were planning on taking out the cabinets since Tom told me to do the job right he had to run the hardwood underneath the cabinets also. Tom used to work making and installing custom cabinets so I trusted he knew what he was doing. But taking out the cabinets was a bit more work than we anticipated (like every other part of this project). The countertops were screwed the the wall with screws they couldn't get to. Nothing a sawsall can't handle though. So out came my stove and sink. They're sitting on the deck outside. Out came my refrigerator. It's plugged in the front room. The cabinet the sink went in wouldn't go out the door so it's also in the front room. And at this point Tom looked at me and said, "What are we doing?" No going back now though. This is our current state:
Although since these pictures Tom has removed the rest of the linoleum and sanded the floor down with a floor edger (until midnight one night). I've come to realize how much I took my kitchen sink for granted. We did eat one night out of the crockpot that I plugged in the bathroom.
That was a pain and I don't think we'll be doing it again. I'm embarrassed to say the kids and I ate at McDonalds two nights in a row the past two nights. They'd be thrilled to tell you that though. So until we get our floor back we'll manage. We really want to replace our cabinets but with our growing family we really need to do our basement next. Although after this another project might be a long time coming. Hopefully my next post will be beautiful wood floor pictures with cabinets, a sink, an oven, etc. Cross your fingers for us.
