Tile Demo and Getting the Floors Refinished

Well, my priorities changed. Probably something everyone else expected to happen, kind of like when you know your friend is dating a jerk but you just have to wait for them to figure it out?

Originally my main goals were:
Pull up carpet and expose hardwood floors then refinish
Paint master bedroom
Paint living room

Well, I was stressing out about the painting. Not because it's hard, but because I have no idea what colors I want to paint those two rooms. And I feel like I can't decide until I move in and figure out how my furniture will be arranged. How can I determine accent walls if I don't know where I want my bed or couch yet? So I've decided to wait until I move in to do this. Instead I'm going to try and get the kitchen primed for painting and still get the floors done.

On Monday, I removed all the wallpaper in the kitchen and breakfast nook (full details on this project). It took about 4 hours. Then I took a nap on the only piece of furniture in my house, the built in bench in the breakfast nook, while I waited for Steve to come over after he got off work.

While I was napping, The Scooter Brigade showed up to help me remove the tile some idiots had laid down over the hardwood in my entryway. Matt had offered to help me get it up. He and his neighbor Ron who has been helping him with his kitchen remodel came over on their scooters and were fantastic cheap labor.

(Scooter Brigade)

It's the same ugly white tile that's in the kitchen. It's about 3 feet deep and 6 feet wide.

(Sara and Steve from my first night in the house removing carpet from around the entry tile)

The Brigade showed me how to get the tile loose from the cement hardy boards but then proceeded to remove all the tile for me which I really appreciate. Then Matt showed me how to get the hardy boards which were glued and nailed to the hardwood up. You wedge a crowbar (the claw part) under the edge, then pound the hell out of it with a hammer to get it all the way under, then push down on the crowbar to tear some up. Then use the hammer to remove the nails. Matt remove about two squares of the board then left the rest to me.

(The hardy board underneath the tiles)

So in about 35 minutes, the Scooter Brigade removed all my tile and got me started on the hardy board which took me about two more hours to remove (it's more difficult than the tile). I ended up taking off about 13 tiles worth and Stephen did the last 5 for me and my aching back.

(No more tile!)

Stephen and I also pulled up the last of the carpet that we had left on the add on portion of my living room and sanded and scrapped the rust of my medicine cabinet so I can spray paint it white (that's what he was doing while I worked on the tile).

Monday I also had the contractor who did the termite repairs on my house last week, Wayne Ziegler, come over to give me a quote to refinish my hardwood floors. That is the one project where EVERY article/blog/message board thread I've read on the topic says "don't do it yourself". It's super time consuming (sand with several different grains of sandpaper, vacum dust, one coat of finish, sand again, second coat of finish, buff). Plus it's easy to mess up and over sand a spot or not apply the finish properly. So I decided I'd grudgingly spend the money to have a pro do it. I was only going to get the living room and hallway where I'd removed the carpet done because the 3 bedrooms had been finished before. But Wayne is giving me a REALLY good deal to do the whole house, so I'm just going for it.

Tuesday Wayne came over and sanded the floors and I think they're going to look pretty awesome! He was able to lighten all the water stains (I'm not having him sand the floors all the way down and restain, we're just doing a clear coat over the top).

(Living room after it was sanded - the dust is still on the floor)

Today he and his son will be patching the nail holes from the carpet tack strip and the tile. Wed first coat of finish. Thursday light sand to smooth it/pop any bubbles, Friday final coat of finish. It's going to look beautiful!

While Wayne sanded, I cleared out all the junk previous tenants of the house had piled up on the side of the garage over the years: lots of cardboard boxes, wood reminants, a broken patio umbrella, broken office chair, high chair, weights, the old garage cabinets, shower curtain and rod, some kid's stuff, a few hundred feet of mesh fence and posts, a dog cage, and the old flourescent worklight from the garage. Matt has his friend's truck that I can use for to haul this stuff to the dump, I just need to see if I can sweet talk Matt into helping me in exchange for a few hours of labor from me to help him on the kitchen remodel he's in the middle of.