About two weeks after we moved in, Home Depot was having a wonderful sale on dark bamboo floors for $1.50 a square foot (I LOVE sales!) So we picked up every box they had and headed home excited to rid our lives of our wonderfully horrible carpet.
As we were figuring out how much it would cost to have someone install the floors, I realized we could save a lot of money by putting it in our ourselves. Me and my crazy money saving ways.
Needless to say, after many tears, broken boards, yelling, many weekends, and a few boards that still just don't make the cut, the floors are in. One of our "oops" below, but the molding will cover it once we get them installed.
If you are attempting to put in your own floors let me give a few tips that will really save you a lot of time and heartache.
1.) When you start, have the correct tools. No matter if you are putting in tongue and groove flooring or traditional flooring, spend the money and buy or rent the right tools because in my experience, a hand saw just won't cut it (no pun intended).
2.) Put in one full row of boards all the way across horizontally and work off of that. I thought we could fill in one side, move the furniture, and then install the other side. NOPE! This was our biggest mistake. Just bite the bullet and move all of the furniture into another room.
3.) Just go ahead and take all the molding off the bottom. I have seen some people that can do it without taking off the molding and just installing quarter round after, but in our experience just take them off, make your life much easier.
4.) Last but the most important part, If you are planning to paint, paint before the old stuff comes out. I can be quite a messy painter and I am dreading painting the rest of the walls for fear of dripping on the new floors.
Before and after pictures of the floor to follow :)
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