Carpet

We have been anticipating the step of getting new carpet put throughout the house for a while now. The big day came on Friday. B spent all day Thursday getting stuff ready. To save some $$, we decided to do all the furniture moving and tear out of the carpet ourselves. We also wanted to be able to seal all the floors because well, we had puppies at one point and we did not want to risk that puppy-training smell to seep back up through new carpet. So, by the time the installer came on Friday morning, we had T's room, the living and the dining room completely emptied of all furniture and carpet, padding, staples, etc. I painted all the floors with Kilz and we were ready to go. I was excited and anxious to see everything come together.

I ran to town for a while Friday morning. When I got home at noon, the only thing that was done was that pad had been laid out. OK, I can deal with that. I went to C's class party at school at 2. When I got home at 2:40, the only thing that was done was that carpet had been laid in one room - not stretched or attached or anything - just laid out. By the time 5:00 came and went I was getting downright cranky and panicked! It was Halloween - I have kids that want to trick or treat. I will have a slew of kids trick or treating at my house. I have friends showing up at 6:30 to go trick or treating with us. I have to empty 2 more bedrooms of 5 rooms worth of stuff, pull carpet in one and paint the floors in both. Oh My! How on earth is that gonna happen?

My dearly beloved friend Slisa shows up with her wonderful husband and their son to trick or treat at our house and see how things are going. Slisa sees the panic in my eyes and being the awesome friend she is, insists on staying to help us. Her hubby and B get started on the back-breaking manual labor. Brandi-Loo-Hoo and her family show up to trick or treat with us and see what is going on, so her hubby, too, jumps right in to help us! The moms and I head out to take the kids trick or treating and while we have a ton of fun with each other and with all the kids, the men clear the rooms and get stuff ready to go for us! I love my friends and their men! I really, really do!

After everyone leaves and we get the kids laid down for the night, B and I keep plugging away - he gets the carpet and pad out of our room and starts takin' care of the stapels. I paint the floor in S's room and then part of ours (where the mattress wasn't laying for us to sleep on.) I then think - I really should touch up the paint on the walls while the carpet is outta there so I don't have to worry about being too neat, so I take care of that before crashing for the night as well! We finally pass out on our mattress laying on the floor around 1am.

My alarm goes off at 6:30 so I can get the hair color out of all the kids' hair, clean up the kitchen the best I can, fix my coffee!, shower and get me and help B move the last of the stuff out of the way before leaving with all 3 kids at 8:30 so T and I can go to play practice! We have a great break there, then come home, eat lunch and I can start, at that point, moving some stuff back into the kids' rooms that are done and doing some light cleaning and organization.

I can basically keep doing little stuff then the rest of the day. The guy gets done for good around 5 and B and I start putting all the big stuff back in place. We finish around 7. We pops in frozen pizza for he and the kids. I head out to go out to eat and a movie for Brandi-loo-hoo's birthday! I get home around 11 and just pass out again.

Sunday morning, we sleep in then get started right back in with putting the house back together. We work on this ALL DAY! Finishing with vacuuming the very nice looking new carpet around 3pm. We got changed and cleaned up very quickly to go take family pictures at the lake at 4!

We get back home close to 6:30, have dinner and work on laundry until we pass out last night.

Today has been a pretty normal day. It does feel like I have a clean house and a clean floor which is FABULOUS! I've been trying to spend some time playing catch up on paperwork and first of the month stuff and I'll be there soon, I'm sure. But right now, I'm going to fix snack for the kiddos, clean it up and then we're all heading out to enjoy this beautiful weather!

Here's some pics of the new carpet. It's not all the impressive unless you understand the old carpet was matted down, had the cheapest pad imagineable, had big bare spots along almost every seam because the carpet was defective and was incredible stained and sticky-feeling. I have been walking barefoot all day and it is WONDERFUL!!