Flooring Update: Baseboards

Chris has finished putting in the laminate flooring downstairs. First the Kitchen:

And the Dining Room:

It looks pretty awesome...albeit unfinished as it needs baseboards and transitions, but Chris has already started on that. After a trip to the Home Depot that involved a truck rental, the supplies are here and work has started:

And a progress shot:

The floors are already looking more finished. I'm pretty excited....I can't believe how far these rooms have come. Yay Us!

A Half Done Dining Room

So while I haven't made any further progress on the wallpaper...whoops. Chris hasn't been slacking nearly as much. He has been hard at work on the Dining Room floor. It is practically halfway done. Last week:

And now this week:

So Chris is well on his way of meeting his end of the year goal of finishing the floor. Hopefully I can channel some of his drive into working on that wallpaper. 

Yay...Flooring!

So while I was having a very unsuccessful Sunday with the wallpaper, Chris was having a really good day with the flooring. Last week the kitchen looked like this:

The fridge was pulled away from the wall, but he had gotten a solid start. Now it looks like this:

The fridge is back where it belongs and he took care of the difficult part around the cabinets. This isn't the most impressive part of his Sunday. That would be the dining room:

That is really an improvement! Now if only I could steal some of his mojo for that wallpaper this weekend!

Ugh...Wallpaper

So I mentioned last week that I started on the wallpaper in the kitchen and didn't get very far.

Well, I spent the better part of Sunday working on this very wall...and to be honest I didn't get very far.

I'll admit it is much further than last week, but it isn't very encouraging:

The wallpaper just refuses to come off in strips. Oh well, can't get too discouraged...because there is no quitting in the middle of this home improvement job. This is a very visible wall in quite possibly the most used room in the house...whoops! I'll just keep scrapping away. 

Drowning in a Paisley Sea

So while Chris started work on the Kitchen I thought this would be an awesome time to start removing the black paisley wallpaper:

Oh yea, not sorry to see this go. Not one bit, not even the impressively camouflaged light switches and outlets:

Props to the wallpaperer and all, but this needs to go. That being said, I am in way over my head on this one. Rather than it being an easy job for one or two weekends, I am in double trouble, because guess what was under the first layer of paisley wall paper?

That is right, a second layer of paisley wallpaper. Ugh! The worse part is that this second layer of wallpaper is so old that it doesn't peel, it disintegrates,  which is why after about an hour and a half this is all I had:

Whomp, whomp. They did start out with a nice blue color at some point tho...some some consolation. 

More Flooring...in the Kitchen!

So Chris has done a stellar job finishing up the flooring in the Family Room. This past week he got ambitious and started in the kitchen! Here is a picture of the continuous floor from the Family Room into the Kitchen. 

And now a picture going the other direction:

This does require us to have our fridge a couple of feet from the wall though...but it will be worth it when it is all done. Also, he is committed to doing all three rooms (Family Room, Kitchen, and Dining Room) as one, so he technically has started in the Dining Room too.

I am especially excited to see the nasty carpet in the kitchen go. Hopefully by the end of the year, the only carpet left in the house will be the stuff in the master bedroom. A tall order for a Christmas gift, no?

Finally, a Flooring Update!

So with the loss of electricity after Sandy, Chris' progress on the hardwood floor had stalled...about half way through:

He was also unsure of the molding he wanted to use and therefore wasn't sure how much of a gap to leave. Well, he made up his mind (a surprise for a future post) and got to work over the weekend.

The room looks awesome and he is so close to being done (such a tease, isn't he). Here is another angle (sorry for the glare - the floor is more reflective than I thought):

So all that is required is a few finishing touches and a couple square feet. Then he wants to move on to the kitchen. I had high hopes of taking down the  wall paper and painting before he got there, but with the amount of progress he has made, and the amount of time I spend studying (another two tests this Friday - bleh), I don't think that is going to happen. Who knows though, maybe I will be super productive after my last exam this block (Monday)! *crosses fingers*

Front Yard Reveal

Some black mulch, spring bulbs, and a ton of manual labor and it is finally time to reveal the front yard makeover. So first the befores:

Jungle-tastic!

Shaggy for sure. And the in-progress pictures:

Wasteland with a Peony. 

Getting Better and now with mums. And the reveal:

So non-jungle-like it hurts. What you can't see are the 112 spring bulbs (Daffodils, Tulips, and a pair of Irises) that I planted under the mulch. I am hoping for a colorful spring. We also plan on getting some plants in the spring once we see how it fills out. As a bonus, we also did the tree on the otherside of the driveway, before:

And after: 

Flooring Update III

So last week I left you with a little teaser of what the hard wood floor in the Family Room was looking like:

Well, Chris has been working at it a bit each day. The giant pile of boxes has gone from this:

To this (clearly now a work zone and no longer a foyer - Sad face):

Clearly, Chris is hard at work. And now the floor about half way done!

Ohhh, Ahhh. I think it looks really nice so far. He looked at molding this past weekend at the Home Depot, but he hasn't committed yet. And there is still the other half of the room to finish before he gets to put that down anyway. Still very pleased. I think the wood floor is an even better color than I expected in that room. So back to work to finish the second half!

Flooring Update II

So Chris has been kicking some home renovation butt this month. I have another impressive, in my opinion - I might be biased - update on the flooring. So last week I left you at this:

Well, he went to town tearing up that floor:

Yup, and it is all gone - the baseboards too:

This is impressive, but that's not all. He even started to put down the moisture barrier:

And as a teaser to both you and me, he started to put down some of the flooring:

This is way more progress than I could have hoped for and I have a feeling that this room might even be ready to light up the fireplace for the first chilly days of fall that will be shortly upon us. 

Front Lawn: Falling Cleaning

In early September, Chris picked up some bulbs for fall planting:

By some, I mean a lot. There is a big bag of daffodils in featured above and we later picked up another big bag of tulips to mix it up. Both of these are early-mid-spring flowers that require fall planting. I have big plans to get them planted before the close of October. Hopefully, in future years this will be not a big deal, partly because these bulbs will come back every year, and mostly because we won't have to deal with this first:

So maybe, and just maybe, I left the front yard get a bit out of hand. It wasn't really my fault, I swear. The plants left by the previous owner just took over. This left it looking very messy, and devoid of variety - you can barely make out the peony that I found in May.

So Chris and I decided to take some drastic measures. The plan is to replace this triangle of miniature jungle with some mulch and a more 'planned and maintained' look. This will be bordered by some landscaping stones and for this season at least, will feature those bulbs and some mums. So we started ripping it out:

Oh, look, the peony. I was going a bit slowly, so Chris helped me out:

So right now it looks a mess. I'll admit. But this is just the first step. We went to Home Depot and looked at landscaping stones and mulch, but the weather yesterday was gross (like fifties and rainy) so this is a project that will continue into next weekend.  

Flooring Update I

So now that the wooden floors have been purchased and are awaiting placement in the Family Room. Chris has already gotten started on pulling up the nasty carpet that was there:

Unlike in the Kitchen and Dining Rooms, it appears that they put down a laminate floor prior to putting down the carpet:

It has a faux wood pattern to it, in 1 foot tiles. It is pretty awful. Better than the carpet, but just barely.  Chris is intent on ripping it up too, so that there is a level base to put the flooring on. Here is a small section he already did:

The black is actually the glue that was holding the old tiling down. It is otherwise concrete. Chris has made more progress than I expected in the first week, but there is still a long way to go. 

Chris Inspired!

So I hauled some butt to finish up painting the den in a reasonable amount of time. And not to toot my own horn, but it looks awesome and Lucy is thoroughly enjoying it:

In fact, I did such a good job that Chris kept saying that he wanted to get started on the floors for that room. We decided on laminate because there is no subfloor (just concrete) and real wood floors would be both expensive and beyond a DIY project. Chris was just waiting for a sale at Costo (the only place he will shop these days). Well, low and behold, there was one this weekend. He cleared the shelves - getting enough (hopefully) for the den, kitchen, and dining room:

And came home with a ton. It is now sitting in the entry way because he claims it needs to "acclimatize" before he puts it in:

I am a little bit intimated by the amount of flooring and what a big job this is going to be, but it is a Chris job - so more power to him. I will keep you posted on the progress.