living room- quick before and after

when rose lived here- so much pink, squishy carpeting, pastels, carousels...

we feared the fireplace might be pink too, but it was just pink by association... phew!

one day we'll manage to eliminate all of the lilac, but for now, it's still on the front door, and i'll randomly spot it someplace. out!

first night at house...

what a sad, icky carpet

the stairs looked like they'd been partied on by a rat or something.

however, we were getting excited anyway, doing the back-to-back photos:)

ok, getting started now. we pulled up the carpet which was pretty simple, and came up without a fight. the intense work was really all ahead of us, mainly the de-staple/de-nail work, which was brutal!

feeling far less excited now... i'm on the floor pulling out 8,000 staples and tocco's ripping up the nasty bits of long spiked wood around the perimeter. these jobs were tough! maybe we had the wrong tools... though i can't imagine which tool we are without these days.

hours (days? ;) later we were able to do the final sweep... hooray!

we arranged a contractor to come sand it while we were at work. we popped over for a look, and were blown away. a perfect hardwood floor! now that the work is done i'm actually pretty thrilled it was preserved under that carpet for decades. no stains, nothing broken, no patches, just a really pretty floor...

cut to two months later. the view this morning:

(still missing some artwork, a rug, and I want to replace that tv console with something nicer, but it's getting there.)

What a difference. And those stairs (they got their own full day of work) and are pretty perfect now.

ahhhhh

FIN!