Okay, so I’ve been wanting to redo my floors for, like, forever. And I finally decided to tackle it. I went with this “keel dancing pine” thing – I think it looked pretty cool, and hey, it’s wood, so how hard could it be, right? Famous last words…

First, I pulled up all the old nasty carpet. That was a workout in itself! Dust, staples, you name it, it was under there. Found some interesting things, too – a couple of old coins and a lost cat toy. Go figure.

Next up, I checked the subfloor. It’s this concrete slab, and luckily, it seemed pretty level. I did sweep it like a madman, though. Didn’t want any little pebbles messing things up later.

The Tricky Part

• Laying the underlayment. This was basically like rolling out a giant, thin foam blanket. It was supposed to help with sound and moisture, which sounded good to me. I taped the seams together to keep everything in place.

Then came the actual flooring. I started in one corner, like the instructions said. Getting the first few rows down was the biggest pain. I used these little spacer things to keep a gap between the boards and the wall (for expansion, apparently). And let me tell you, those boards did not want to cooperate. Clicking them together was a whole process of hammering with a rubber mallet. I felt a little like Thor!

It was slow going, to be honest. Cutting the boards to fit around doorways and corners was a bit of a nightmare. I borrowed a jigsaw from my neighbor, which helped, but it still took some finagling. I might have messed up a couple of boards in the process…oops.

But, little by little, it started to look like a real floor! I kept at it, row by row, until the whole room was done. Took me a couple of weekends, and my back was definitely feeling it, but I finished it.

Finally, I installed the baseboards, which covered up those expansion gaps and made everything look nice and tidy. I caulked around the edges, just to be extra sure no moisture could sneak in.

And that was it! I stood back and admired my handiwork. It wasn’t perfect, but it was mine. And it looked a heck of a lot better than that old carpet. Plus, I learned a ton – and got a pretty good workout in the process. Now if only I’d taken “before” pictures…