So This is What it Means to Own a Home..

Although we have made a lot of progress in the past 13 days, it seems like every project we attempt, no matter the size, is trickier than we expect. This weekend we were planning to put in the hardwood floors in the living room and upstairs hallways, a project at the top of our priority list since our current floors are so gross. We ripped out all the trim and had planned to pull up the laminate tiles throughout the week to prepare for the new hardwood.

We visited Lowe's a few months ago and just fell in love with the Allen & Roth Hickory 5" hardwood floors. We were told that since there is a "7 Days or Less - Special Order Express," that we could come in the week before and order them no problem. 

We were so excited to go to Lowe's and put in the order that we were blindsided when we were told that there is a Hickory "raw material problem," and the wood wouldn't be available until mid-December. We looked around for other options but Lowe's was the cheapest by $1.00/sq. ft. In order to make a long story short, we decided to buy the Hickory from a Lowe's in Hamburg and we will have to rent a truck to pick it up. Bummer.

Luckily, we have a million other projects we can do until we get the wood. We decided that the first mini project of the weekend would be to install the lamps for the living and dining room we just received from Lamps Plus. We had removed the track lighting and repainted the ceilings so poor Andrew was living in the dark for the past week.

We decided on the Possini Euro Lilypad ceiling fixture for above the couch, a funky light that is way out of my comfort zone. Our first clue that this was going to be more difficult than expected was the process for putting it together.

When we felt fairly comfortable with the state of the light, it was time to mount the light to the 9' ceilings. I wish someone was with us to take a picture of us both on the ladder, me standing under Andrew, holding the lamp above my head and yelling because my arms were tired. Tracy Anderson would have been proud. The light was secured to the ceiling but when we turned on the electricity, no light :( It was time to blow off some steam and go out to a "progressive dinner" with friends.

Going out so late was a bad idea so we started the next day very tired and not feeling fantastic. Andrew made me rally - we had a big day ahead of us, time to paint the hallway ceilings. On Friday I completed all the trim, so it was just a matter of rolling the walls Saturday morning. 

The cats are my biggest helpers

Since the ceilings are so high, we had to get a special edge painter for Andrew to use to complete all the trim at the top of the third floor steps.

I wish we would have used the tool on the walls in the living room because it did a really nice job and was super fast.

After sweating out a bottle of wine each, the upstairs hallways were done and we were feeling good!

Timmy approved of the hallways as well

It was time to tackle the lights again but this time we called reinforcements, my sister's boyfriend, Cody. I cannot thank Cody enough for helping us, he is much taller and stronger and we couldn't have done it without him.

This time when we went downstairs to turn on the electricity, the breaker was stuck in the middle. We asked Andrew's dad what to do and, after inspecting the breaker, he told us that our main breaker was down and we needed to call an electrician. Fantastic. I called the electrician and we decided to not lose momentum and put up the light above the dining room table. We needed something big so we decided on another Lamps Plus light, a Wide Pendant Chandelier. I was nervous about this light since getting the right height was going to make or break the look of the dining room. 

The boys measuring the height of the light

The bottom chandelier should be 39" from the table

We spent a good hour playing with the lengths of the wires to ensure that the height was right and to make sure the light was level. 

Cody to the rescue

So hard to make it level

When we thought we had it perfect, we screwed the lamp into the ceiling and stepped back to look at the final product. It was beautiful but the top of the light came out of the ceiling 30 seconds after we let go. Seriously!? Now what? We unscrewed the light to find that the piece in the ceiling was broken.

We Googled the problem and found out that in order to replace the piece, we would have to cut a hole in the ceiling. No way, we just painted them! Andrew got creative and was able to use a dry wall screw to secure the normal screw into the broken piece. We were finally able to hang up the dining room lamp. Meanwhile, the electrician came, walked in the door, flipped the breaker and it worked. $85 for all 2 minutes of his time :( 

We are going to try to just forget about that $85 and be happy that we have both lamps up...and they work!

Living room light!

Dining room light

Never a dull moment! Looks good though, right!? Now we just need those wood floors...