OK, those that know me well know that I am a DIY’er when it comes to many things including home improvement projects. There are three reasons for this:

1. I don’t like to pay others to do what I can do myself
2. I love to learn new things
3. Sometimes it’s actually fun

Now, I have been remodeling my house for many years. With the help of my housemates (to whom I am ever grateful for I could not have done any of this without them) we have managed to remodel almost every room in the house. We have gutted and drywalled, ripped up carpets, put in floors, painted, sanded, stripped, tore apart, put back together…you name it we have probably done it. I never was the type to do the “before” and “after” pictures, mainly because by the time I thought about it, the project was more than half way done and I didn’t see the point.

With this last project though, it was different. I thought it would be cool, now that I am blogging again, to show some of these projects. The one that follows is the floor that runs from the dining room into the living room and into the front foyer of the house. We ripped up the carpet in the living room, and then installed Allure from Home Depot. Allure is a vinyl-like floating floor that comes in a variety of looks. Back in November of last year (Black Friday!) I got a great deal on it so I bought roughly 400 sq ft which has been sitting on the front porch since then. Last weekend, with the help of my neighbor and good friend Steve, we ripped up the carpet and laid down thin sub-floor (called Luan) as a barrier to even things up. This past weekend, my housemate Callee and I laid the new floor. All I can say is, Wow, what a difference! It was a lot of work but man, what a difference. Callee and I have installed this stuff three times now and it’s relatively easy to work with, comes in a lot af variety, looks great and is really durable. Anyway, below are the pics! Feel free to leave comments!

God Bless