New floor, going in!

Today was the day! Dad and Mom came over and brought a table saw with them (thanks for the loan, Dave) and Dad and I proceeded to figure out how to install the laminate flooring. The first short row went well enough. Then I thought we had it in backwards and that we had to start in the other part of the room to boot. Approximately an hour or so (at least) later, with many cut boards and another row in, I realized I was wrong and we had done the first row correctly. Back to that part of the room! Save the cut boards for later! With many measurements and thinking things through, Dad and I got past a partition and a width change, and got several rows in today before they had to return to Lakeview. This is the gorgeousness of the new floor:

After Mom and Dad left I put in another couple of rows, and managed to damage myself pretty well:

If that doesn't look sufficiently painful, let me tell you that the camera and lighting don't do the massive blood blister justice. This is what happens when I'm using a hammer and I look somewhere else to check a gap. I didn't say nice things and I had to pause to put something cold on my wound. The only thing I could find was a bag of frozen cranberries. Those probably ought to be tossed before next Thanksgiving...

Tomorrow I plan to start up the table saw at about 8am. That ought to please the neighbors!

Projects...Continued

After a month of supreme productivity (for me) while house-sitting for Bill and Vanessa, I can list the following as accomplished: installed back "dog patio," painted bedroom, painted dining room, painted living room, tore out carpet and pad from living room/dining room, fixed toilet, put new filters in faucets (ok, that was an easy one), installed new shower head, removed brush from yard, crawled under house and right back out after spiders and dust freaked me out, contemplated how to fix squeaky floor, dismantled old cookstove (wood/electric combo from the 40's...quite the monstrosity), had old stove removed/new range put in, fixed screen doors.  I'm pretty happy with myself, but the BIG project is about to start: installing laminate flooring. Dad's bringing me a saw and I get started on that tomorrow. Whew. I'm hoping to take a short vacation before school starts, but we'll see how it goes. Here's a picture of what part of my living room looks like right now. Oh, and I've also torn out the linoleum at the door and the particle board underneath. Still haven't figured out how to effectively fix the squeaks, though. Cheers!