Coming up for air

Here's just a quick note to say that we're still alive! Most of the work around the house has been finished. The nursery has been painted and carpetted. Our room has been painted, carpetted and furnished. And the kitchen has been re-floored. There was a bit of a snafu with the kitchen, which added more work. The original estimate for the flooring only had the kitchen floor. We overlooked the back stairs and landing which were the original linoleum. So coming from the back door, you would have seen carpetting going down to the basement, a nice laminated floor in the kitchen, and linoleum steps and landing. Hmm... I paid the installer a little bit extra on the side to do the landing, but then he ran out of material for the stairs. That left the task up to me. I found the laminate (under a different name) at Menards. The stairs were a little bit of a challenge since the pattern in the kitchen did not follow the long edge of the plank. So to match the pattern, you would have the cut the plank up in squares, and join them end to end. My jig saw cutting has never been remarkable, so the first tool I got was a table saw. The next purchase was an electric nail gun that gave me the most problems (I eventually found out I could use the pancake compressor I had with a pneumatic air gun). And thanks to Steve, the quarter-round was mitered (and it will never look as good as his!).

So here are some quick pictures. Finished ones to come later...

The bedroom minus the shades

The flat-panel TV that may live on top of the dresser

The kitchen floor

And the stairs...