Dining Room Remodel- Sanding & Staining hardwood floors

The Laird finished installing the Red Oak flooring middle of last week, which meant it was time for quick transformation- Staining the floors.  We rented a sander from the local Home Depot for the day for a reasonable price of $60/day.  We thought the sanding would go quick, but in reality it took longer than we anticipated due to some of the un-level boards.  Once sanding was completed, we mopped up the loose sawdust.

Installing final board

Sanding 

The trap door to the basement

Over the course of 2 days, we applied 2 coats of Miniwax Provincial stain.  Thankfully, the weather has been unseasonably warm (in the 50's) this weekend, and we've been able to open all the windows air the house out.  These photos are right after the 2nd coat was applied and the floors were still wet.

Though we still have many more tasks to complete before our dining room is complete, this was a huge step forward to having a usable dining room!

This view makes me smile!

Our next step is to finish the floors with a protective coat.  Originally we were going to use Miniwax Polyurethane, just as we finished the stairs 2 years ago.  When we finished the stairs we were not living in the house, so the VOCs and fumes from the polyurethane and stain were not an issue. Now that we live where we are working, we decided to investigate other less toxic methods.  We settled on Tried and True Original Linseed Oil & Beeswax- A Highly Polymerized Linseed Oil with beeswax.  Boiled Linseed oils dry quicker than raw linseed oil, however most brands of boiled linseed oil today is not actually boiled.  Instead they contain metal additives that achieve the same results, but contain VOCs.  Tried and True was the only brand I could easily find that was actually boiled and contained zero VOCs.  Linseed oil and other natural oils are often used on wooden furniture, and make for an antiqued appearance.  The oils soak into the grains of the wood and cure the wood as it dries- thus protecting the wood.  Polyurethane works different in that it hardens like a layer of plastic on top of the wood surface.  Though we are not entirely sure how the Linseed oil will work on the floors, we decided the zero VOCs made it worthy of testing out.  

Amazed to finally see our room transform from a "work" & storage/junk room to a dining room.  Remember when it looked like this:

Dining Room Remodel- Hardwood floor installation

What a great start to 2016!  With a long weekend on hand, the Laird, his father and I worked hard to install the Red Oak hardwood flooring in the dining room.

We purchased our load of lumber from www.flooring.org.  I was quite pleased with the selection of widths, as they offered every inch width from 1" to 12" wide planks.  Another feature that influenced us to purchase from flooring.org was not only that they offered wider planks (Lumber liquidators only offered 5" wide planks in Red Oak), but the length were available in longer sections as well.  We ordered the random lengths of 2' to 10' planks.  The price comparison between Lumber Liquidators and Flooring.org unfinished red oak also proved that flooring.org was a better option, even with the shipping costs.

Though it was easier to get our kitchen flooring from the local Lumber Liquidators, the process was only slightly more involved ordering online from flooring.org and having it delivered.  The prices were better as well, and we were able to get exactly what we wanted, the long length, wide planks.  We do have to go through the extra work of staining and finishing our flooring, which we did not have to do with the pre-finished Lumber Liquidators flooring.  But this was necessary since we needed to match the flooring in the dining room to the stairs that enter there.

The long lengths and wide planks also made the installation go much more quickly.  Here are a few photos to show the progress of our dining room remodel.

 BEFORE:
Originally the dining room was likely used as a family room, as it had this huge Buck Stove taking up more space than was necessary or efficient.  Though the Laird would probably have preferred to live with things "as is", I decided it was imperative that the wood stove corner get removed.  The "rock climbing" stones above the dark hearth were not adding anything appealing to this room.

 Another feature in question was this pine paneling surrounding only half the room.  The Laird likes the pine paneling because it is the perfect look for his "Jungle Room"/ Library.  I am willing to leave the pine paneling in the corner up to the edge of the window.

1)  Back in September, we were able to find an interested buyer for the Buck Stove.  Though we didn't get as much money as it was worth, I felt like we got paid to have someone move it out of our house and take it away!  It was a win-win situation for us and the buyer.

2) The next step was to remove the wood stove hearth.  One weekend proved enough to demo that corner and make things feel like we were making progress.




After demo- we clearly needed to empty the room of all the junk that had been getting stored in this unused part of our house (See photo below).  Cleaning up felt so good.

3)  Then the Laird ripped out the carpet in order to make room for the 1100lbs. of Red Oak flooring getting delivered.  It's important to allow the wood to acclimate to the room for a number of days before installation.





Here is the Laird picking out the perfect 1st piece of wood to lay down along the wall.

5)  And finally the INSTALLATION!  The most difficult part was laying the first row of wood because our walls are not straight.  But after the Laird worked out the challenges with the first row, the rest was mostly smooth sailing.  After putting hardwoods in the kitchen, and now in the dining room we are firm believers that it works best/ most efficiently with 3 people.  I, the Lady work on the lay out of each row of board.  This is an important task, as it involves making sure to avoid H joints or cascading joints.  I lay out a couple rows, and the Laird cuts wood down to size and then he and his father then nail the pieces down.  This is of course all after a sheet of moisture proof underlayment is lay down.


Before any wood could be laid, the Laird had to level the right side of the room with concrete leveling compound (notice grey area).

 Once the Laird's father showed up, the work went more quickly and efficiently.

Notice the changes outside.  We worked on this for 3 days.

Once Lord Jeremy arrived (on the third day), we were cruising!  We were able to get just past the stairs to the trap door entering the basement.

Though we are only about 3/4 of the way done with the flooring installation, it feels so wonderful to have mostly finished flooring in our dining room.  Definitely feels so much cleaner than what was there. We are getting there, and the end of interior projects feels so near.  Next steps are to finished the last quarter of floor installation, then rent a large floor sander and then start staining.  After staining we will work to finish the floors were a few coats of polyurethane.

Finishing touches on a handful of mostly-done projects

This past weekend, the Laird was highly motivated to finish a number of "almost finished" projects.

1) Installed the final piece of wood floor in the corner of the kitchen
One final piece of flooring in the upper left corner that was overlooked during the previous flooring work days.  Small piece had to be cut, then ripped, and nailed in with nail gun.  Refer to Kitchen Renovation posts, to see what the floor used to look like.
Eventually, our hope is to add a nice big breakfast/ eating island to the center of the kitchen, and move the table and chairs to our dining room.  In the meantime, we have a spacious dance floor!



2) Installed the bull nose trim and wood flooring on the landing of the stairs
For the past 8 months, we've been walking on a cardboard covered landing.   Another project checked off the long list.   We still have to fill nail holes and touch up stain and add some trim.  We had to purchase unfinished Red Oak tongue and groove flooring to finish the landing.  It's stained with 3 coats of Provincial Miniwax stain and finished with 3 coats of polyurethane.
























3) Installed the trim and sill for the kitchen window
During the kitchen renovation, we discovered that this wall was not straight; it has a slight lean outward.  Somewhat concerning, however considering the house has be around since 1860 we just went with it.  It order to prepare the walls for upper cabinets, the wall had to be leveled.  Refer to step by step kitchen renovation post for photos.  Leveling the wall, also meant deepening this window & sill.  Finally trimmed & 1st coat painted- it makes a world of difference in the feeling of almost finished with this kitchen.

4) Installed shelf brackets for open shelves in kitchen-  It took me a while to finally decide on shelf brackets for these open shelves in our kitchen.  I found these particular brackets on Etsy.  Our hope is to get our hands on some barn wood boards for the shelves, however, in the meantime we are using some of the pine panels taken down during the renovation.  Surprisingly, they the stained pine looks decent enough!  It's amazing to have the extra storage space and be able to clear off the counter tops down below.  With the open shelving finally installed, the kitchen is looking more and more like the "farmhouse kitchen" we had imagined so many months ago.






































With a handful of half finished projects finally completed, the Laird and I are feeling encouraged!  There's still more to do, but the original Project List is dwindling down and the house is looking more and more like a house (instead of a construction zone).

Current projects in the works:  Hanging coat/ robe racks for the closet, entryway & bedroom.  Tongue and groove barn-styled plank door for lady genevieve's bedroom.  And the garden is in full force, so there is more to update there as well.   Look forward to the posts to come!

Reaching Our Threshold

One of smaller changes of our renovations was widening the doorway between the kitchen and the dining room.  The original doorway was abnormally narrow and short, making the house feel very disconnected.

 

The contractor opened up the doorway as much as the wall could structurally allow.   Once the drywall was completed, we would begin preparing a new threshold.  The doorway from the Great Room into the kitchen had a uniquely worn and distressed piece of solid pine as the threshold.  The Laird liked this look and wanted to recreate it in the other doorway.  I suggested that it would be difficult to match that old worn pine, and would look nice to match the new red oak kitchen floors.  He purchased a long, unfinished piece of red oak to span the doorway.  I used our can of extra Nutmeg stain that came with our cabinets to stain the threshold.  After 3 coats of stain and then 3 coats of semi-gloss polyurethane, it was finally ready for installation.

The distressed threshold between the Great Room & kitchen

Creating the step out of 2 x 4 boards

The original floor sloped from the kitchen to the dining room.  Widening the doorway gave us a reason to  create a step down into dining room from the kitchen.  The Laird was not entirely sure how to install the threshold, but came up with an idea.  He found 2 small pieces of thin metal that he nailed into the bottom of the wood.

Then he covered the place where threshold would be with Liquid Nails- the metal flaps pointing towards the kitchen. 

We applied weight to area as the Liquid Nails dried over night.  Then we were able to finish the floor.  A few more projects successfully checked off "The List"- the floor & threshold completed!

Taking on renovating an old farmhouse has been fun, but a ton of work!  We knew going into this adventure that it would be a lot of hard work and patience, but we did not know what our threshold would be.  I think we've reached it.  Thankfully, we're coming to the completion of many projects we've been in the middle of for a while- primarily the kitchen and stairs.  Seeing the finished (or semi-finished) outcome makes it all totally worth it.  In the midst of all the work, when it was below freezing outside, and we were trying to keep warm by the heat of our wood stoves, and the house was a construction zone- we kept asking ourselves, "What were we thinking?!"  Now with winter behind us, and the current house projects coming to completion, and the chance to be outside walking the property, or working on the garden, we are reminded why exactly why we came to live at this place we affectionately call REDWOODSHIRE!

Step by Step Kitchen Renovation- Part 2

Original Kitchen

And so the kitchen continues to come together!  The prior post left off with the cabinets, counter tops & sink newly installed.  Though there is only one photo depicting this next round of work- it has taken a few months to do all the parts.

1) Installed GE Slate gas range oven
2)  Hardwood floors
3) PVC Wainscoting Backsplash
4)  Installed GE Slate dishwasher

We moved into Redwoodshire in the midst of major renovations.  The contractor had finished raising the upstairs ceilings & installing new staircase.  The Laird took on the HUGE task of renovating the kitchen.  And because being Laird and "kitchen installer" is not his primary job, the work has moved at a slow but steady pace.  Each task took a bit longer than we anticipated.  We moved in, expecting that we'd get the cabinets installed within 2 weeks.  But it was discovered that the outer wall was leaning outward and needed to be leveled.

So we lived at Redwoodshire without a kitchen for... a month.  The apron sink was installed at the end of the first month and the gas range at the end of the second month- let me tell you what it's like to make meals with a microwave and wash dishes in the upstairs bathroom tub for that long!  Call us crazy, but we did managed.  A bit higher class than camping.  At the time Lady genevieve was only 8 months old!  Needless to say, we are more and more grateful for each piece that gets completed.

HARDWOOD FLOORS:  The original floors were a red and white checkered asbestos tile.  In pictures it appeals to some, but in real life it was quite dingy.  We envisioned hardwood floors for our farm kitchen.  We purchased pre-finished Red Oak flooring and moisture proof underlayment from Lumber Liquidators.  Though we would have preferred longer planks, they came various sizes under 4ft.  We chose to do mixed width planks of 3 1/2" and 5", and alternated them in a somewhat structured pattern.  We would have preferred 3 different widths for an old farmhouse look, but that was not available with the wood we purchased.

Slate GE Dishwasher

Slate GE Gas Range

APPLIANCES:  Of note are the new Slate GE oven and dishwasher.  GE is the only company to offer this Slate color.  Originally I had imagined that we'd get a white dishwasher (we weren't planning to replace to oven yet) because I wasn't a big fan of black and felt like stainless steel looked too modern.  But when I went to Home Depot I saw the Slate appliances.  Upon research I found that only GE carries Slate colored appliances.  I fell in love with them and thought they would go so well with our rubbed oil bronze knobs and faucet.  I also felt that a white dishwasher would detract from the apron sink.  After much convincing and a good case of price comparisons, I was able to sway the Laird to go with the Slate appliances.  A cool feature of the slate is that fingerprints do not show up on the surface- which is a common problem with the stainless steel appliances.  GE has rebates running on appliances all the time.  If and when you purchase new appliances and are considering GE, be sure to see the different rebates available and time your purchases right.  Check out current GE Rebates.  We currently have propane heat, and had to convert our oven to take propane.  When we searched how to instal and oven and convert it to propane, we found a YouTube video of a guy converting the exact model oven that we had purchased!  It was so helpful.

BACKSPLASH:  We installed a PVC wainscoting for back splash.  This can be purchased at Home Depot or Lowes.  Easy to install with a nail gun and liquid nails.  It's quite amazing what a difference it makes.  It is also a wonderful solution for those old plaster walls that are difficult to repair.  My hope is to extend the wainscoting the full perimeter of the kitchen at some point.

The Laird installing the new dishwasher

The larger tasks (cabinets, sink, floors, back splash, & appliances) are just about done, however there are quite a few finishing tasks to complete (trim & window sill, finish painting...)  And in time we will get there.... Though it is sad that our makeshift "dishwasher in the box" island has disappeared- we are glad to finally have a working dishwasher.  Though not worn out or broken, the old dishwasher (the Lady of Redwoodshire) is grateful for a a break.   Eventually we want to build a breakfast island for the massive open space in the center of the kitchen. But this is a project for a rainy or snowy day in the future!  Right now it's time to be outside exploring, gardening, playing, and enjoying the arrival of Spring...