Okay, mostly just carpet, but I wanted to throw a little N’SYNC reference in there and I sure hope you got it.

Kyle and I have been in this house for about 2 ½ years now, and since Day 1, we’ve been wanting to replace the carpet. It wasn’t in the greatest of shapes when we had moved in: a little dingy, snagged in a couple spots, and there were three different kinds of carpet throughout the house. Yep, three. The bedrooms were all the same colour & pile (horrible loop carpet that snagged easily), the stairs were a pile carpet, and the basement is a grey/brown loop carpet. Here’s the proof:

Yep, it was a mess. We have a feeling that the basement and stairway carpet were original to the house and that the stuff in the bedrooms was changed out at some point by the previous owners. Anyway, after we moved in, things only got worse since we have two big dogs. Daphne and Campbell puked on the carpet a few times, leaving gross stains behind no matter how hard I scrubbed the carpet, and their nails got caught in the loops on the bedroom carpet, leaving behind little snags that just got out of control:

The worst case though? When Campbell was fairly new to the household we would crate him while we were out running errands or while I was at work. On day, he must’ve eaten something that didn’t agree with him, because when I returned home I walked into his “room” to find that he had somehow managed to push the bottom tray out of his crate, chewed a HOLE in the carpet while still trapped in his crate, and then pooped all over the place. The hole was mighty impressive, other than obviously frustrating:

That was two years ago. Kyle and I strategically placed a nightstand over the hole and called it a win for the time being.

Finally, about a month ago, we decided to put our grown-up pants on and bite the bullet in buying new carpet. There isn’t anything wrong with the basement carpet, but we thought for better continuity we should replace both the stairs and the bedroom carpet. After shopping around, we finally decided on a pile and shade we liked, and went ahead and ordered the carpet. That’s where the frustration kind of began.

Kyle was going to tear up the old stuff himself because having the contractor do it was going to cost somewhere around $500. He did it on the weekend I was in Vancouver and Isla was having a sleepover at my mom’s, and while we had to live with bare floors and stairs of doom (see photo over there –>) for a week, it wasn’t so bad. We had to explain to Isla that the stairs were dangerous and that Mommy or Daddy had to carry her down the stairs. (She has become independent in that she insists on going down the stairs with no help.) We also told her to be careful in her room so she didn’t step on a tack strip. We managed to survive the week without having to rush to the hospital for a tetanus shot.

This past weekend, the installers (who are contractors) were supposed to come and install the new stuff. We were told by the company we bought the carpet from that the contractors would be there around 9:30-1o a.m. on Friday to start installing. They showed up around 9:45 a.m., but instead of starting on our carpet, they dropped off some of the materials and said that they had to first go finish a job just outside of town, and that it shouldn’t take to long. Okaaaaay …. So Kyle and I sat around almost all of Friday morning wondering when they’d show back up, and finally by 2 p.m. when they had yet to show up, I gave the guy a call. He said they’d be there by 4 p.m. WTH??? So 4:30 p.m. comes along and they finally show up. They managed to get one bedroom done (Isla’s new room) and said they’d be back Saturday morning around 9. They didn’t get here until 9:40 a.m. and they didn’t leave until around 8:30 p.m., and took a sweet 1 ½ hour lunch break. AND THEY STILL HADN’T FINISHED THE CARPET. Our stairs had nothing but underlay on them, so they said they’d be back Sunday afternoon around 2 p.m. to finish the stairs. FML. (Why so late? Well the guy also runs sound at his church and apparently that’s more important.)

Sunday they got here around 3 p.m. (I’m more than certain he dicked around at his parent’s house before deciding to show up for work on time.) It was about 6 o’clock by the time they were all done. FINALLY. I don’t think I’ve ever been so happy to see someone leave my house and never have to return.

Don’t get me wrong – the carpet looks great. Other than a couple of dings they put in my walls (which will be brought up with the company who hired the contractors, as well as their tardiness), Kyle and I are super happy with the actual installation. And our house is back to normal!! The new carpet has brightened up the bedrooms SO much, and it feels so wonderful on my feet. Kyle even added some end tables that we never use to our bedroom as nightstands, so now we don’t have to use old cardboard boxes anymore ;)

Like I said before, we also moved Isla over to what was the spare room and is now her “big girl” room. We were eventually going to move her there whenever we decide to have baby #2, but since the furniture was already out of there, we moved it over now. I plan to paint it a bit more “girly” in the future, but she seems to be liking her new space so far! It’s a little big bigger than her old room and the layout is a little better too, so she has more room to actually play in there!

I’m working on refinishing a bigger bookshelf for her as well, which will replace the one that’s in there and will match her new furniture whenever I decide to get that. (Probably not until we have another munchkin.)

So there you have it. We are SO glad the weekend is over with and the carpet is installed. I love the look of my floors now and couldn’t be happier! While the price of the carpet wasn’t the lowest, it was definitely worth every penny, IMHO ;) No more mis-matched carpets, no more snags, no more holes in the floor! (And if either one of the dogs ruins that for us in less than a month, they’ll be in deeeeeeep trouble.) We did decide to leave the basement carpet as-is since it was in decent shape, and I’m glad we did considering how long it took to install just the bedrooms and the stairs …

What’s the most hellish house reno you’ve endured? Was it worth it in the end?