Chapter 10: Kitchen Renovation

The hunt for hardwood flooring was slightly a tedious process. We made a visit to Rusmer Flooring in Bridgeville one Saturday afternoon to have a look. They gave us a good deal a few months ago on an area rug for our master bedroom so we were hopeful we’d be lucky again with the hardwood.

I think I must have been feeling hormonal that day because I was more annoyed than usual by the fact that none of the sales associates approached us for help. Granted, I hate when I get approached in a department store for help, but for some reason I feel like a store like Rusmer should approach the customer no matter what. So because we didn’t get any help, I insisted we go home.

Feeling in a better spirits the following Monday, we headed back over to Rusmer to try again. And thankfully we had a totally different experience! Our sales associate was cute as a button and extremely knowledgeable about hardwood floors. We left the store with about 8 samples of different wood stains to see how they matched up to our current hardwood floor stain.

I wasn’t expecting a perfect match – I realize that is impossible. But I wanted to find a stain that was at least close enough where it would be a soft transition into the kitchen from the hallway and dining room. It’s amazing the stains we thought would be a good match in the store, but they turned out to not be even close when we got them home.

As a result, we headed back to Rusmer on Wednesday to turn in some of the samples and pick-up a few more. Afterwards, we also headed to Home Depot and Lowe’s to check out their hardwood options and pricing.

After 5 days of debate and moving the samples from one room to another at different times of day, we settled on Somerset's Natural stain. And true to fashion, Rusmer gave us a fair price.

The following weekend, Keith’s family kindly came to Pittsburgh for a visit to help install the floor. Having already installed hardwood flooring before, this project was easy peasy for the guys.

I have to say they did an EXCELLENT job.

I couldn’t be more pleased!

And just like I hoped, the stain we selected proved to be a soft transition between the rooms. Yes, it’s clearly not the exact same stain, but it’s not glaringly obvious that’s not. I think Walter even approves!

We’re getting closer to our new kitchen that I can almost taste it! And speaking of taste…stay tuned to find out what it’s like living without a kitchen for a few weeks.