Late last week we finally began installing our hardwood floors at the new house. The project is going well — we’re doing the work ourselves — but it’s proving to be time-consuming. That’s not ideal when you’re on a tight schedule: we’re scheduled to move in this weekend and hope to finish four bedrooms and a long hallway before then. Once we’re a bit further along and breathing easier, we’ll share a detailed play-by-play of the process. For now, enjoy this slightly dusty photo of the first room we officially finished: our master bedroom (we still need to add baseboards and quarter round).
While the tight timeline has me stressed, that worry pales compared to the nervousness I felt during the first step of the project: getting the wood home. Lumber Liquidators called to say my order was ready for pickup. Clara was napping, so Sherry stayed home and I headed out to rent a $19 truck from Lowe’s, as Lumber Liquidators had suggested. The order was too large for our car, and renting a truck was cheaper than paying for delivery. At Lowe’s I also bought quarter-round molding for the four bedrooms and the hallway, since they require a purchase to rent a truck.
I expected the load to be larger than our previous cork flooring shipment, but I was surprised when a forklift began moving a massive stack of boxes. Seeing it all ready to load made me glad I’d rented the truck. That feeling faded when I noticed one tire on the truck was compressing noticeably under the weight. It wasn’t flat, just lower than the others — enough to make me anxious. The Lumber Liquidators crew positioned the load to ease the pressure on that tire, and we agreed it was safe to drive the short three miles to the new house at a slow pace.
The three-mile drive felt interminable. The load was somewhat unbalanced and the boxes were stacked high without very tight strapping, so every turn made them lean. I drove slowly with hazards on in the right lane, watching the stack shift. After a few turns I managed to redistribute the weight enough to calm my fears of boxes spilling onto the road and getting ruined. With only a handful of turns left, I expected a slow but uneventful finish.
Then it started to rain.
In all my worry about the load, I hadn’t noticed storm clouds rolling in. It wasn’t a light drizzle but a sudden downpour, and dozens of boxes of hardwood were protected only by cardboard. My blood pressure spiked. Fortunately, a previous renter had left a large plastic drop cloth in the truck bed, so I pulled onto a side street and covered everything before it got soaked. Maneuvering off and back onto the main road took a few nervous turns, but the immediate threat was mostly avoided.
A block later the rain stopped, but the wind caused the makeshift cover to flap loose. I had to pull over again to remove the drop cloth entirely. At that point I realized I had barely made it a mile from Lumber Liquidators.
My heart was pounding, but the final two miles were thankfully uneventful. I arrived at the new house a little greyer around the edges, but with the truck and the flooring intact. Then I remembered the unloading step — and realized I was alone. Sherry and Clara were still at our other house, where it hadn’t rained at all. Without a forklift, I began unloading the boxes one by one into the house. There were 50 boxes in total.
Unloading took about an hour. Each box weighed 56 pounds and was roughly five feet long. I moved them from the truck bed, up a few steps, through a narrow garage doorway, and into the dining room to acclimate before installation. I didn’t have the energy to carry them all upstairs that day, so that task would wait. After nearly having a panic attack during the drive and then hauling what amounted to 2,800 pounds of wood inside (yes, I did the math), I felt I’d earned a break.
The next day Clara was already enjoying the new flooring. Here’s hoping she loves it even more once it’s out of the boxes and fully installed — that’s our goal for today. Woot!