Perseverance

     Well our kitchen floor renovation is completed and the only word I can use to describe it is the one in the title, perseverance!  Our originaly plan of simply removing the existing tile to expose and refinish hardwood floors vanished immediately as once we got the tile up we were surprised to see the vinyl tiles underneath the ceramic tile had been glued to the hardwoods with an asphalt based glue!  I tried to remove it without chipping the wood and got about one square foot section in almost an hour.  So I called my interior designer, Kelli, who was out picking up paint and other supplies and asked her to do the hardest thing a designer has to do, make a last minute change of plans on short notice so the project could still be finished by the end of the weekend.  

     I left this morning to come down to Klamath Falls, OR for work for a couple days and we knew we had to get the kitchen back in operation before then so Kelli went to work coming up with an alternative plan for the floor.  Our first thought was retile it, but neither one of us likes tile that much and theres no way it would get done in time.  Then we thought of a laminate type floor, we went to a couple places and actually found one we liked and nearly bought it but opted to take a sample home first to see how it would look.  Then the Pinterest Gods came to Kelli and she had the thought of doing a finished plywood floor, an idea that is all over Pinterest and actually looked pretty cool.  So at about 6pm on Saturday night we got back home with sheets of plywood ready to be cut down to strips and made into a floor!

     Sunday was a long day as we got up early and got after it as soon as we thought we could without ticking off the neighbors.  Ten minutes into the day we ran into another speed bump when the air compressor we were using of Dad's quit working!  I made some phone calls to rental places and got some prices while I waited to hear back from Dad to see if he'd taken his back up compressor down to Arizona or not, turns out he hadn't and after he brought it over we were off and running again, at the crack of 2pm!  We managed to get all of the flooring down the same day, well technically it was Sunday morning by about an hour before we wrapped up for the day:)  We fell asleep immediately, feeling like we were on an episode of Renovation Realities, and my alarm went off in what felt like 20 minutes later so I could pick up stain for the floor right when Home Depot opened up.

     So we applied a coat of stain, and let it dry for the day while I did some work and took a trip to the dump, then applied two coats of sealant and our project was done!  When it was all said and done we ended up with new paint throughout, including a chalk board wall that you can kind of see in the pictures, and a kitchen floor that we love!  We had some definite trials and tribulations through this project, but we learned two improtant lessons, keep at it until the finish and you'll most likely be happy with the results, and never start a project like this when you have a time limit!  Obviously we've learned nothing from all of those episodes of Renovation Realities where almost no one meets their deadline!  In the end though it all worked out and we couldn't be happier, now it's break time for both our wallets and our bodies to mend before the next project!:)

Remember, sometimes during trying times a little bit of perseverance is all that you need:)