I bet you’ve started to wonder if I nailed my foot down along with the new flooring. Not possible – it’s a floating floor – no nails required. But just like everything else in this house it has taken longer than I thought it would. And of course, once the floor was finished I just had to get out the Christmas decorations and see how they looked in a nearly finished house.
Prepare yourselves – I have photos…
Before:
Yikes!!! What a mess. Those rolls of blue stuff in front of the door are actually the foam padding that goes down under the laminate flooring. It helps seal things like water and dirt out and also helps with the sound issues of big guys with heavy boots walking on wooden floors. If you look over the top of the chair on the right you will see the top of one of the piles of flooring boxes. We bought a whole pallet of the stuff – 48 boxes. You should have seen our poor old pickup loaded down on the way home. Being the thrifty (cheap) ranch wife that I am, I had figured out just how many square feet of flooring I needed but the nice guy at the store convinced me to get a few extra boxes “Because you always waste some”. Not me – I did the dining room. living room and master bedroom and still have enough left over that I can do the floor in the big walk-in closet. Yipeee!!!
And here’s the living room after:
Oh my goodness – is that beautiful or what? This is called Driftwood Oak by Maple Leaf – Premium Laminate Flooring. For looks and ease of installation I give it two thumbs up.
I just noticed the orb by the top of the tree – what do you think? Is it a reflection from the Christmas lights or the windows? Of course there are lots and lots of lights but only one orb – don’t you think that’s kind of interesting? OK, back to the floor before I freak myself out.
Sub floor before:
Can you say “Slivers in my feet”? I knew you could.
But just look at it now:
Wow! It’s like we live in a real house now not a construction site. We have lived with the sub-flooring for so long (about 4 or 5 years) that I’m not sure I remember how to take care of a real floor. And the poor dog – I can’t tell you how funny it is when Levi comes whipping in through the door and slides across the floor. I always run over and look for skid marks but he hasn’t left any yet. This is pretty tough stuff. We still haven’t given it the ‘spur’ test but I’ll let you know how that turns out when it finally happens.
The best thing about it is that it was so easy to do. The hardest part was moving all the furniture out but the rest was just like putting a giant jigsaw puzzle together. Just remember with this puzzle it’s OK to cut down the pieces to fit! And the only tools you need are a good set of knee pads, a hammer and don’t forget to buy the pry-bar and bumper pad that they recommend for pounding the pieces in place. A good compound miter saw on the front porch helps too.
And what do you do when you get new flooring? Throw a party of course. We had a house full of family and friends for Thanksgiving and then last Sunday some of the girlfriends came over from Custer to see the Christmas decorations. It is the party season.
I love our new floor!
I love your new floor, too. Beautiful!
Beautiful floor!! You did a nice job!
Thanks Clifford – it’s amazing what a difference it makes! Hope your winter is going great.
Thank you for the great photos. I just bought this flooring today and seeing your photos make me anxious to install it!
Do you have any of this product leftover from your project? I know it’s a year later and we’re 2 boxes short
Sorry I took so long to reply – Christmas was great but busier than ever. Yes, we do have some extra left over – 2 full boxes are sitting here looking for a new home. I don’t remember what we paid for them but we can work out the details. Send me an email at jstearns@hughes.net and we’ll figure it out.
what store did you buy the driftwood oak from
Sorry, Just saw this was hanging out there – we bought it at Menards in Rapid City