Laying our own floors: The what and the why.

We decided, pretty much as soon as we moved in, that we were going to slowly replace all the flooring in the house. We opted for the most basic carpet in most of the house, minus the kitchen and master bath, because it was free and the upgraded options didn't do a whole lot for us. We figured that as the carpet wore we would be able to just replace it with better options. Well that happened a lot sooner than we imagined it would in the front room, due to a trouble making kitty and the fact that our builder used crap carpet and installers. This sped up the process a bit and we had to decide on a flooring type. We landed on hardwood/bamboo because the front room is rarely used and we figured it might be a formal dining room down the line. So we took on the task of finding a color/type. This took way longer than expected. We went to about 5 different stores and brought home dozens of samples. Nothing looked great with the purple paint in the front room and if it did it turned out to be too expensive. Finally after weeks (yes weeks!) of deliberation, we decided it was easier to paint and pick a floor that we loved and fit our budget. We landed on this:

Sorry about the flash glare!

This is Home Legend hand-scraped bamboo in cafe, which can be found at Home Depot. We loved the color, the hand-scraped detail, and it passed the durability test (we hit it with a high heel multiple times, didn't leave a mark). Once we picked it we had to pick a time to lay the floor. It was going to be a few weeks at the time because Andy was going to be gone. Next post, I'll talk about prepping the floors.

 

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Adventures in Adulthood

I very rarely feel like an adult, usually I feel about 16, but a really awesome 16 year old who lives with her BFF and has expendable income. Anyway, I sometimes get a wake up call and realize I have grown up. One of those wake up calls happened the other day when we decided to go shopping for tile and I got excited. Like freak-out-OMG-YAY excited. Yes, I got that excited about tile. WTH happened to me? I remember hating going to home improvement stores as a kid but now I love it. It's moments like that one that make me realize I am a little bit of a grown up. Only a little.

Anywho, more on the tile later. Yay!

Overloaded

Our entire house is beige. AKA blah. Now I admit we did pick beige as our paint "color" but it really is overwhelming to be in a house that is suppose to be yours and not have it really feel like yours. Our house feels more like a model than a home. It's not just all the beige, it's also all the rooms that are half empty because we just don't have furniture to put into them. This has turned my head into a scary place because every day I am making lists of things I want to do to make this house a home. And folks my lists are like scary long. So to help make us accountable and also get my thoughts organized I'm going to share the list of things I would like to get done. To help us out even more I'm going to highlight the ones I want to get done before our friend house warming (We are also planning on having a big family and friend house warming in the warmer months so our families can make the drive down if they want). This list is in no particular order:

• Paint living room (Completed 1/12)
• Paint the front room, media room, office, and our bedroom
• Put mirrors in the hall and half bath
• Hang toilet paper holders and towel bar/circle 
• Hang curtains and/or blinds in all bedrooms
• Re-cover black and white chair for living room
• Put legs on the record player stand to make it higher
• Make or buy a liquor cabinet
• Finish media stand for living room
• Unpack all boxes that aren't going into storage
• Hang mirrors, shelves, and decor in living room
• Buy an additional chaise for the couch and shelf for behind couch
• Buy a bigger TV for living room
• Figure out art work for front room
• Buy Star Wars posters for Andy's office
• Buy desks for Andy's office
• Make accent pillows for living room 
• Get big TV and the old couch up into the media room

I know that there are more things I need/want to do but I just can't think of them all. I think I may have to start carrying around a small notebook and pen to keep track of things when I think of them.