A real Labor Day

The plan was to get the floor done in the hallway this morning, then get started on my wife's office. So go the plans of mice and men. Mice would probably get this done quicker. Admittedly, I'm not rushing because I want it done right; I don't want to stare at mistakes or be tormented that I could have done a better job had I been more careful or taken a little more time.

Today, though, seemed to go a little extra slowly. The pieces didn't want to lock tightly without some strong "encouragement"--several whacks, firm but not too hard, with a mallet. As I would get one piece tight, a little gap would appear somewhere up the line. Back and forth, until the gentle beatings finally won over. I'm blaming that on the humidity.

At 6PM tonight, I finally had to give up as I tried to get the second piece in the last row to fit snugly. I'm afraid any more encouragement could break it. It has a notch cut out to go around the right side of one door jam and the left side of another with a short wall in between. My cut is pretty good, and I don't want to have to redo that, so I'm going to let it rest. I'll give it a go later this evening or early in the morning, hoping the humidity will be down.

My wife's office will have to wait, unfortunately. This week, I have already set aside Wednesday and Thursday evenings to work on the floor, so I should finish up the hallway and get a good jump on her office before the weekend. I have no other plans this weekend but working on the floor, which should allow me time to finish her office.

I can feel the muscles beginning to ache a little already from today's labor. Maybe an Epson Salt bath would be a good way to unwind for the day and possibly head off more aches and pains tomorrow. And a good night of sleep.

Slow and steady... well, at least slow...

Most of July was lost on the big flooring project. I started to have abdominal pains, many days quite severe, that I just couldn't shake. My wife believes it was just my "nervous stomach" acting up over the anxiety of doing the floor. OK, that probably didn't help, but it certainly was not the only--and probably not the biggest--factor.

A couple of weeks ago, though, I finally started to make headway on the floor. I started in our master bedroom, as planned, finishing about 75% of the nearly 200 sq. ft. on a Saturday afternoon. Taking a couple of hours here and there, I installed the final piece in the MBR this past Sunday. As is typical for most projects, the final 4 pieces took about as long as the rest of the floor! Each one required tedious cuts along the wall and around door jams. I took my time trying to get it right, and I am very pleased with the results. (If you've ever installed flooring, especially interlocking laminate wood, you'll know why this wasn't so easy!)

Next is the hallway as I cross over to the smaller bedrooms. I want to install it without thresholds at the doorway, to give it a nice flow throughout all the rooms. This makes it a little trickier, but I think it will look very nice and be worth the effort.

Now that I'm back to taking Nexium to help with the abdominal pain, I should make steadier progress on the floor. My wife is so anxious that yesterday she started moving furniture out of her office and into mine (the temporary storage room for this project)! I'll get in there as soon as the hallway is done. She endured sleeping on the mattress on the floor in the MBR for a few weeks, so I don't want to test her patience too much on finishing her office. If I do, she's likely to pack her bags...