Carpet is Ordered!

Carpet shopping is now in my top 5 for Least Fun Things to Shop For. Others on the list include car shopping, apartment hunting, and Christmas shopping. Thank God we don’t have to worry about apartments anymore. This whole ordeal made me SO glad we’ve been doing the work ourselves. I couldn’t handle dealing with self-serving salespeople and contractors for the duration of this project.

The good news is that the carpet for the house has been ordered. We learned that gray (or grey for John) is not currently “in” and no one carries any shade of gray in stock. But there is an abundance of Johnson County beige in stock everywhere. Oh beige, you are the bane of my existence. We were able to find something in the right color and in our budget. Needless to say, we did not go with the Stainmaster stuff John previously commented on.

We ordered Mohawk SmartStrand through Big Bob’s for the whole house. I picked out a frieze for the bedrooms and a short plush from the living room and stairs. Here’s a swatch of what we ordered, we’ll have more pictures after the install. It’s pretty neutral and basic and that’s what we were going for. I would rather have our furniture, the fireplace, and our art and other belongings be the focus rather than the walls or flooring.

The frieze:



The plush:



We went through Big Bob’s Flooring out of their Overland Park location and they were great to work with. They were a good balance of helpful and knowledgeable without trying to blow too much smoke up our a$$. That seemed to be a problem at other stores. We may be going back there when we get around to the flooring in the furnace room. Is it still a furnace room if we have a hydronic air handler? Hydronic-air-handler-room just doesn’t roll off the tongue.

The plush will be in by the 20th but the frieze won't be in until early June so we have a while before the install, which is a good thing. Before then, we have a "little" list of things to do:

• Finish the fireplace hearth


• Pick out and place tile around the fireplace and in front of the side door; grout


• Finish painting the railing


• Finish painting the master bedroom


• Sand and top coat the joint compound on all cracks and windows


• Prime the remainder of the living room


• Paint living room


• Remove remaining carpet and pad


• Take doors off hinges


• Move all furniture into the kitchen

Minor details, really. Most of this stuff is small and can be taken care of between now and the end of next weekend. After the install, we're down to trim, cleaning, cleaning, cleaning, and unpacking.

I would recommend to anyone looking into new flooring to stay away from retail stores with salespeople that work on commission, unless you have several thousand dollars, time, and patience to spare. The outlet store approach saved us money and my sanity.