The Kitchen
After the kitchen rebuild, the old parquet floor cried out for attention. I put it in over twenty years ago. The week of January 12th in 2009 we had the pros come in, sand it down and refinish it. We went from a dark stain to a natural finish.
The natural finish of the new vent shows the contrast with the color of the old stained parquet flooring.
The old metal grate on the cold air return was breaking down and faling apart due to the heavy traffic from the wheelchair. The new oak grate has bridging under it for additional suport.
The lighter new floor finish is much brighter and cleaner.
They sanded the floor down about an eigth of an inch and it came out pretty good.
Sanded floor before filling and finish sanding.
Tom, John Carney and Denny Ditiacur used a router to cut the recessed edges of the cold air return so the grate would fit flush. That oak is hard! The results demonstrate the value of their hurculean efdort.
New oak cold air return register.
They hand scraped the finish under the cabinets and around the wall.
After sanding, filing and finishing - a beautiful natural red oak floor.
The Livingroom
In December of 2008 Tom said the carpet in the livingroom had to come up so we could refinish the oak hardwood floors. When we moved in to the house in 1976 it had a nasty yellow/gold carpet that never looked clean. We replaced it in 1978 with a dark maroon carpet, the best Lazarus had to offer at the time. Pop thought I was being extravagant. We only got about 30 years out of it. Lasted through two dogs and two kids in pretty fair shape. The wheelchair was eating it up pretty quick toward the end, though.
The thirty year old carpet in the livingroom.
We had pulled up the carpet in the hallway a few years ago, when Mike, Tom, Paul and John P. widened the entrance to the bathroom and installed a new door. At that time Mike counsuled refinishing the floor instead of covering it with laminate. The floor was badly stained in a few places.
The 'old' floor by the front door.
The carpet came up and Tom set to work preparing the floor for sanding and refinishing. That turned out to be a long term project.
The 'new' floor by the front door.
Tom had to remove a lot of boards that were damaged and replace them - about 30 square feet in all. This is not an easy task, but the results were remarkable.
Some of the many replaced boards.
The flooring on the fireplace wall was damaged by water in spots as well as mistreatment by previous owners. Many were replaced. I think it came out well.
All of the boards in the lower right corner were replaced.
Sanding wasn't enough to lift all the stains completely. Tom applied a honey colored stain which really sharpened the contrast of the wood grain.
About 6 rows out from thius wall were replaced.
Tom did the final work; sanding, filling, finish sanding, staining and three coats of polyurethane while Heidi and I visited Aunt Mary in Syracuse. I think that week about killed him. I could have had the pros do it, but I suspect they would not have done as well as Tom.
Heidi stained matching molding and Tom installed it. It came out very well.