One Floor at a Time

From Coronado Avenue

Work is continuing, fast and furious, on the new-to-me house. Painters are there every day, doing a fabulous job of patching-before-painting. I was very anxious for about a week at the slow pace of progress, but now I smile every time I walk into the house. Late yesterday afternoon Donny and Mike got into my sewing room, and found problems under the south window and in the ceiling. But they quickly drove over to Donny's to retrieve some drywall pieces and expertly patched the problems. These guys are not "professional" painters, but they're doing one highly professional job. The "family room" (southeast bedroom) is finished; by noon today my bedroom will be finished; and by tonight the sewing room will be finished.

On Thursday my Starbux buddy, general contractor Duane, came in and pulled the carpet up from the first floor. I had only pulled a portion by the living room fireplace and seen gorgeous oak flooring. Imagine my horror to arrive on Thursday night and realize the previous owner, at some point probably 60 years ago, had refinished the edges around the area rugs. Horrors. (This action totally falls into the category of "what were they thinking?!".) The picture above shows you what the floors looked like.

Yesterday (Saturday), the guys from Mr. Sandless came in to work their magic. These young men were incredible dedicated workers. They wet-sanded the floors with their special cleaning solution. The floor show (pun intended) included Jim falling on his butt as his feet flew out from under him on this incredibly slippery solution. Alas, the wet-sanding did not remove the excess of old varnish-or-whatever around the "area rugs". These boys got down on their hands and knees and sanded and scraped around the edges of the four "area rugs" to remove that excess. Then they put two coats of ginger-colored sealer, followed by three coats of polyacrylic.

From Coronado Avenue

This photo shows the same area as the first photo, after one coat of sealer. Big improvement, but not wonderful. I was thrilled with Mr. Sandless's work. I was not a happy customer, but I was a content customer. These guys did the absolute best they could. To have brought the flooring back to its original 1927 glory would have cost me a couple of thousand dollars more. My worst case scenario, if I feel I can't live with the result, is to place area rugs down again (which I'll probably do anyway).

From Coronado Avenue

The library is probably the most noticeable. This photo shows the room as the second coat of sealer is being applied. Closer to the camera you can see the portion of room that is dry with one coat of sealer. It was very interesting to see that the previously-covered floor in this room was much lighter than in the other rooms.

From Coronado Avenue

Contrast the light "area rug" in the library, previous photo, with that in the living room, above. But, "area rugs" aside, look at that gorgeous oak flooring.

I've mentioned that this house has a back stairs and a "maid's room". The seller's nephew, whose grandfather built the house, told me there were never servants in this house—it wasn't that kind of family. There were six or eight children in the family—I think he told me eight—and every bit of this house was filled with family, not servants. That said, the "maid's room" has pine flooring, as does the back stairs, where the "front" portion of the house has oak flooring. It makes me wonder if the grandfather/builder was building the house for someone else, who backed out of the deal, causing the grandfather to decided to inhabit the house himself. Oh, if these walls could talk!

So that's the Thursday and Saturday activities. On Friday, the security system guy and the cable guy were there. I now have a working security system, high-speed Internet access, Wi-Fi, and cable television in the family room and the sewing room. Yesterday the water was off most of the day, so I couldn't do any kitchen cleaning. For part of the day I just sat with a book in the family room. Happy as the proverbial clam!

Today I will get back to the kitchen. First I'll run to Lowe's to get felt pads for the legs of all the first floor furniture. Donny and I will carefully place the dining room furniture back on the pristine flooring. I'll measure the second-floor hall closet for Elfa shelving, to be ordered from The Container Store—this will become my shoe closet. I'll move some more boxes from Ty and Jaci's garage to the new house.

Monday will dawn, bright and early and very cold, with a predicted high of 22 degrees. (It's 3 degrees right now—brrr.) I will meet the movers at the storage unit at 8:00. It will be a long cold day, but by the end of the day most of my things will be in one place. And I'll be a happy homeowner.

I must tell you that with each hour I spend in the house, my love for this house grows. I've been uncharacteristically ambivalent about the house since I first saw it. I knew it was a beautiful house, and that—after my summer Tucson real estate fiasco—it was a residence I could afford. But the purchasing process was so long and drawn-out and—sans Realtor®—filled with the unknown and the unknowable, that I wasn't really sure the purchase would be consummated until two days before closing.

Now I'm past all the confusion and indecision, and I'm absolutely falling in love with this house. The maid's room stays as is and becomes the intimate guest room. I've ordered a yard of whimsical live-laugh-love fabric that will become the basis for a quilt for this room. Y'all come. I can't wait for my friends to see this treasure-house and fall in love with it as I am doing.