Totally Floored!

We recently got our floors redone, from my favorite, albeit horribly stained, sandy coloured semi-shag-type carpet, to new Pergo flooring. (Seriously, I did love that carpet - I picked it out and it was beautiful... it just didn't stand a fighting chance.)

The kids were dead set against it - "It'll be cold like in North Africa!" and "It'll be too hard, now we won't be able to sit on the floor!" Thankfully, kids aren't in charge of the world and we got the floors replaced anyway.

The kids really did have fun helping to pull up the old carpet and get the floor ready for "Bob the Builder" and his son Riley. (Seriously, our contractor's name is Bob! Steven asked him if he was really Bob the Builder and when Bob said "yes" Steven took his picture with my new camera phone!) And now they spend every spare moment testing the low friction characteristics of the floor with pillows tied to their bodies to cushion the strategic falling. Apparently the hall makes a great runway now.


Each of the kids tried their hand at the different jobs that needed doing. Here, Abby is seen using a mudding spatula (please correct me if there is another name for it) to scrape loose the glue that held the under-carpet-padding to the cement floor.




Steven is pictured using an ice scraper (for the windshield of your car) to scrape off the remaining lumps of glued down padding. When the padding was pulled up it basically separated back into the tiny chunks it was made from. (The tool was Steven's idea. It worked great, and of course, and he knew exactly where to find it... in his room! He is quite the toolmeister!) He enjoyed this job so much that he asked to stay up late and offered to give up his x-box time the following day if he could be allowed to finish scraping the room. I let him and he did a fantastic job!


This picture shows Gillian smacking the carpet tack strips with a hammer to loosen the cement nails that held it to the floor. Loud? Yes! Hardwork? Yes! Fun? ABSOLUTLEY!











I know that this picture is blurry (my camera batteries were giving out) but I wanted you to see some fun things about our construction site:

*(Bottom left corner- Laptop) we had fun video skyping with friends and family while the kids worked. It was fun to share the excitement.

*(fireplace to the right) See my secret hiding place for the TV? What good are unused fireplaces, anyway?

*(center) gigantic pile of carpet and padding... I managed to roll all of this (and more that is off camera) up into a giant ball that I pushed out the front door and onto the back porch. While I was struggling to get it through the doorway and it kept rolling back on me, I had a fleeting impression that I was Indiana Jones and the carpet roll was that giant boulder that chases him. Thankfully Bob and son were able to cart it all away to the dump without injury the next day.


Here is a before and after comparison: