Our goal when we were up there was to get everything prepared for the flooring once we were ready to install it. That consisted of completing the painting of the walls, tearing out the old baseboards, purchasing and painting new baseboards for every room (except the kitchen, which already has nice tile flooring in it), and installing them. Remember that this "cottage" is actually an old single-wide mobile home. When these were built, the carpeting was laid throughout, before the walls were put in at the factory. So, when you rip out the old carpet and remove the old baseboards, you have to strip the old carpet out from under all the walls, which then leaves gaps underneath the walls. We therefore bought 4-3/4 inch baseboards so that after we install the laminate, we will have a more modern look than the shrimpy little things that were there before. Whew! My husband spent a lot of time plucking out the old original red 1969 carpet from underneath the walls, not to mention pulling all the nails that held the carpet to the floor.
So, just in case you think our mountain home is a paradise, here is the reality of what we lived with for a week...
Our two new matching bureaus.
Well, not really, but at least we didn't have to live
out of suitcases...
Our newly painted bed frames stayed out in the porch, but...
...at least we did get to order a new mattress
and bed spring, which were delivered the
same day we ordered them...
Below is Mr. Perch's night table,
since at night his "bureau" became the
stand for the oscillating fan...
And our stunning living room is below.
The consignment store furniture that came with
the place will be going shortly.
The wall of the breakfast bar that you see in the back has
since been painted in white semi-gloss trim paint,
and looks great!
At least the afghan that I am still working on looks pretty
on the couch. This is as far as we get with the staging!
Let's not forget the lovely guestroom,
shown below.
It is currently the dumping ground for
everything that we don't know what else to
do with. The lemon yellow walls are now
our pretty greige shade!
And since we still have no TV there, we were entertained
by our marvelous sound system,
Mr. Perch's old 1981 radio.
At least we found a great local oldies station.
I guess if the radio was good enough for The Waltons,
it's good enough for us!
But the best parts of the week were:
Bye bye to the old baseboards...
...and hello to the new ones...
The beautiful flooring was delivered.
We picked it out at the Lowe's store here, and it was a good thing,
since the Lowe's in Hendersonville didn't even display it.
They ordered it from the Asheville store up the road.
It is Handscraped Natural Acacia,
and each board is slightly different from the next,
with some dark and some a little lighter...
They want you to let it acclimate to your home for three days before
installing it, so it can do its thing before we go back up there!
Of course, we had to open one of the boxes to take a peek...
Well, we will return to Birdsong in about a week to start the flooring. Can't wait to see what it looks like.
Stunning or stunned? We are definitely stunned by all of the work! I haven't even started telling you about the bizarre wiring in this place yet. Food for another post!
Have a wonderful evening.
