floored

The floors in our house have always been one of my favorite features, despite the charming angles at which they slope and despite the fact that my dogs are determined to add lots of "character" to them. They are old, wide heartpine floors that I love more and more the longer I live in this house.

According to my iPhone, I guess I don't value my floors as much as I thought because I have zero pictures focusing on just the floors. This was the only photo I could find that shows more than one or two boards peeking out from under a rug. Great lighting, I know.

Since we opened the wall in the kitchen, our contractor wanted to level out the floors as much as possible so it would look better not be extremely hazardous for anyone who walks in our house. The flooring at the end of our hallway has the most severe slope because it was once an exterior porch. To accomplish that, he had to rip up the existing flooring. As if that isn't enough, then he had to put in new subfloor and jack it up to match the other flooring. Oh, and replace the old with new flooring. I was hesitant about this, but the flooring in the back hallway never really was a perfect match with the rest of the original heartpine flooring throughout the house.  It now looks like this. Terrifying.

But, our heartpine flooring has arrived and it looks amazing.

I am so excited about these floors. Dork alert. They came from a company near Pittsboro, NC that uses reclaimed boards from mills, train stations, barns, etc. since the heartpine trees are no longer around. The reclaiming process is actually pretty interesting and you can read more about it here.   

They had to put a few boards down so they could put in the cabinets this week (major excitement!) and I am having a hard time envisioning how they are going to match up with the other ancient floor boards. Gotta have faith. 

Once we finish the kitchen and the back bar, we are refinishing all of the hardwoods in the house. This is something we probably should have done when we first moved in, but we didn't quite have the patience to start another project or wait another second before moving. Now all of the hardwood downstairs will be 7/8" and will be more consistent throughout. I am so excited to see how this turns out. 

I may turn into that person who makes everyone take off their shoes when people come over. Please no. But, I promise to at least post more before & after photos when there is actual progress to report. I know, I know. It's a total cliffhanger. Sorry about that boys and girls.