A Good Shag

When the house was being painted, I told everyone, don't worry about the carpet, I'm replacing it.  I had to. It was the nastiest looking carpet I'd ever seen.  Well, maybe not ever, but there was no way I wanted to be walking around on it for longer than I had to.  See what I mean?

That is not even close to the original color of the carpet. *shudder*

Luckily for me, my brother-in-law was a carpet layer in a former life, and still does side jobs.  Woot!  I went to the Floor Center and picked out a nice but inexpensive carpet to do the job.  My sister helped me measure the space that I needed to cover, so all I had to do was tell the store how much of it I wanted - which was 768 sq ft.  Although we apparently over measured some areas so we had a bit left over, that I sold on Craigslist.  The carpet pad was even included (apparently this is par for the course, but I didn't know that).  $1,400 later I was the proud owner of carpet and carpet pad.  I purchased the carpet on October 29.  Remember, I closed on the 16th and spend the week after painting and cleaning for move in.  I left for a Cabo vacation the weekend I bought the carpet, so we didn't get it installed then. 

After my well deserved vacation, my brother-in-law, sister, mom and dad came to help me put in the new carpet.  There's a lot of work that goes into it.  First we had to clear the rooms - since I had already moved in we had to shift furniture in order to get each room carpeted.  It wasn't so bad though.  Dennis (the brother-in-law) started ripping up the carpet.  First we pulled up the baseboards (I'm replacing those).  He'd cut it into manageable pieces so it wasn't too heavy or cumbersome to carry down.  He also rolled and taped the pieces up so I could store it in my garage and gradually get the pieces trashed.  This part was pretty easy - just dirty work.  Then we had to pull up nails, glue, etc.  My sister went buck wild with the broom and did a lot of the cleaning parts while I did a lot of hauling.  While Kris was sweeping the floors, Dennis got to work measuring and cutting.  Measure twice, cut once. 

He rolled out the pad first and cut those pieces and put those down.  I didn't watch the actual process - too many cooks in the kitchen, if you know what I mean.  It was really a fast process though.  By the time he finished the guest room, Kris was ready for him in the computer room.  He whipped through the computer room, the bedroom, and the hallway and finished those all by...I'd say 4 pm.  It was a long days work and I know it was hard on his knees and hands.  Blood and sweat was truly shed.  But no tears, thankfully.

The stairs proved to be the most time consuming and difficult part.  It took Dennis all of Sunday to get the two staircases carpeted.  Relatively small square footage, but lots of hard work.  In the end, I had an entire roll of unopened, unused carpet pad that I sold on Craigslist, some carpet remnants I also sold on Craigslist, and a few pieces to put down in front of the laundry area to keep my toes warm.  Score!

I gave Dennis a little gift for helping out and with only $1400 spend on the carpet, my entire second floor and stairs looked fresh and new.  I'm so lucky to have family with so many different skills...my brother the carpenter, my sister and brother-in-law the accountants, my sister-in-law the nurse, brother-in-law the carpet layer and sister the jack of all trades.  I'll let Eric know if I need any help with security.

Now, I forget exactly what the name of the carpet I got was...It's not super shaggy by any means, but its also not a short tight carpet either.  I think it might be called a frieze loop.  This picture is pretty similar to what I have.

Image from http://www.centraliahomecenter.com/

Go figure - I can't find any pictures of my own carpet.  Not that those photos would be terribly exciting anyways.  Now, if only I'd get those baseboards replaced...Another day, another dollar.