We are remodeling our house.Since the entire house needs done we are looking for ways to remodel and save money since there is so much to be done. The challenges we have are also that we are of course living here all 11 of us along with dogs and a cat plus other critters. That involves moving everything out and of the room for doing a floor and our living room is the center of the house which takes all the traffic to connect the living area. Our front door also enters the livingroom so we have to go around and use the back door to get into the house. Thankfully since we are using a water base polyurathane it will only be a two days before we can use it again.
We had a nasty old rug that needed replaced. My husband did not want to rip it up until we had something to put down since there is only old plywood that was painted and glue stuck from carpeting. The room is 325 square feet so the cost is going to be expensive with most flooring choices. I searched Pintrest my new place to go for help in remodeling ideas and decorating. I came across home owners that cut up plywood to make wood planks. I loved the idea! My house is a small farmhouse built in 1920 so I am looking for the farmhouse style . I will talk about that another day but it fits the large family style. I love it.
So we followed the directions from this blog. We liked her floor the best using Maple hardwood paneling. Here is a picture of the floor without the polyurathane so you can compare. The wood Jami had more dark colors in the wood grain.my Lowes didn't have much of a selection we took almost every board they had. Another thing that is different was my husband cut the boards to 8" wide. I couldn't decide between the 10" or the 8". Jami I think did 6" so you can compare her floor. I really like the 8" it has the farmhouse plank board feel.
We used the Bona Mega polyurathane that I purchased on Amazon using our Amazon Prime. It is a water base polyurathane so we can apply it every 2-3 hours and stay in the home with plenty of ventilation. Since it has been nice out we opened the windows and the dogs and kids stayed outside. I really liked it because it goes on clear and does not change the color of the floor. Most polyurathane adds a tint of color to the wood. This is clear and easy to use. One tip I would give is to not put it on too thick. It is better to put on 3-4 coats of it thin than trying to do 2 heavy coats. The polyurathane will smooth out better without leaving runs. We did not use the seal first because we were not using a sappy type of wood like pine and we also did not stain first before polyurathane .Bona recommends using a sealer before polyurathane . My hubby just purchased the lamb skin applicator at Homedepot. It worked well. Another tip is we used the air from the air gun to get the fine dust up after we swept.
This is the floor after all the coats so you can see how the polyurathane looks. We did 3 coats.It brought out the wood grain without changing the color so I was happy. I wanted the natural light creamy wicker basket color so I did not stain it. The light color made it so much brighter and made the room look larger. I will keep you posted on how it holds up to a large family living with dogs,horse, mules, and kids going in and out all day. Time will tell. thank you Pintrest and Jami for blogging about it! The final cost was $1.80 per square foot for all the material including nails , polyurathane, wood, and tools. We already owned a nail gun. I love my hubby this was an awesome Mothers Day gift.