I've been shopping for the bedroom set for the past four, yes 4, years. I had an idea in mind of what I wanted, and none of the stores in Austin had it. And I wasn't going to buy anything on-line that I couldn't first see and touch. I almost gave up completely. It wasn't high priority, anyways. Then, a friend of mine started dragging me with her (not that I needed any convincing) to different stores as she was shopping for some furniture, and I started looking more seriously into bedroom sets. It had to have four characteristics: reddish wood, sleigh, padded, and lower height head-board, drawers with rails on the side (not under), and nightstand with more than one drawer. I finally found one set with all those, a platform bed, which wasn't my ideal, but I didn't had strong opinion about that. It should be delivered next week.
Well, since I currently have very little furniture in that room, I decided to also change the flooring before the new furniture arrives; pull out the carpet and install the laminate flooring like I have in other part of the house. And, I was going to install it without hiring a professional! My policy is that if I can do something myself, with a little help from google and advices from people who are in the know-how - I am not going to pay someone else to do it.
I gathered all the material and the tools, cleared out the room, and started ripping out the carpet three weekends ago. The tackstrip took a really long time to remove. The floor required some leveling, so the next few days there were several more trips to Home Depot for supplies. It was all ready for the installation by the second weekend. Or so I thought.
On Friday evening, I laid down one row and one column of laminate to measure first and last board. Then I realized there is a high spot on the concrete that is causing the laminate to dip. I was only fixing low areas. So, in the morning, I went and got a concrete sander, and started grinding that spot. Oh, the dust! I had all the protective gear, but, after maybe an hour, I had to call it quits. What was done, was done. By the time I cleaned up all that dust, it was 1.30 PM on Saturday when we (my brother came to help) started actually installing the floor.
The first row was fine, The problem started with the second row. It was just not going in the way the instructions said. After 4 hours, we were still on 2nd or 3rd row. I was mainly measuring and marking for cutting, and my brother cutting and installing, as we thought it needed strength. We were frustrated. I was already exhausted. I sent my brother to take a break, and I wanted to give it a try. It just wasn't working. Then he had a breakthrough! When he tapped on the board while it was still at an angle, it started locking in! Yay! We finally started making some progress. At 11 PM we were 1/3 done. I was insanely tired. The next day was all rest.
My brother came over again a couple of evenings that next week, and all the laminate was installed by Thursday. I was already tired of this project, so I was dragging on with installing the quarter round, sanding, caulking, filling the nail holes, painting, cleaning up. But, today I finished it all, and finally moved back all my stuff into the closet. I'll wait till the furniture is delivered to move the mattress and actually move back in.
Master bedroom reno - check done!
No comments:
Post a Comment