Home Improvement 3: Stained

Joel had the day off work for the holiday. Well, day off his office job, but he definitely worked all day today. We are pretty tight on time, so thank God we had this bonus day to get things done before we move in. Joel stained the entire house today: two bedrooms, a small hallway, a large living room and a dining room! What an amazing guy... :)

Here are some pics of the floor in its new color. First one taken tonight and second one earlier today in the daylight.

I am pretty pleased with the way they turned out, and really can't wait to enjoy them. Joel still has to do the poly coat tomorrow night (after he gets off work!). And we would still like to paint the walls and put in new vinyl flooring in the bath and kitchen before we have to move in Thursday! Cross your fingers for us. ;)

A word about color choice. What I really wanted was a dark coffee brown, but it was almost impossible to find in stock anywhere. And it was logistically simpler to stick with the Minwax brand, but that also kind of limited my color choices. The first one we tried was Jacobean. We got a sample and Joel tested the colors in a hidden corner of one of the closets.

I found it was too 'black' and not 'brown' enough. So... looking at the samples in Home Depot, I thought maybe Dark Walnut looked browner. Doesn't it look browner? I thought it looked like it might be browner...

From left to right, this is Jacobean after 5 minutes, Dark Walnut after 20 minutes and Jacobean again after 15 minutes. What really confused me was that Dark Walnut @20 and Jacobean @5 look so much alike. I really could not tell them apart at all.

But this is also where I decided I didn't want the black undertones in either of them, so I looked at that sample chart again, and decided to try English Chestnut. I promised Joel this would be the last sample I'd make him buy. ;) Good thing they come in little half-pint sizes. Here is English Chestnut under the first three tests.

It did look a little browner so, even though it wasn't as dark as I would've liked, I said - let's go for it, English Chestnut it is!! And the floors turned out really great. Darker than I thought they'd be, so that was a nice surprise. :)

Now... what color to paint the walls?!

0_o

I'm in Cottonwood, Ca right now for a cousin's wedding. Joel is in Chico working on the house. He texted me this photo tonight of the wood floor after one pass with the floor sander. Says he's encouraged by how well the sander is working and that the discoloration is coming off pretty easily. YAY!

 

He still has a few more passes to do, of course. But, he'll be driving up this afternoon to join us for the ceremony. 

~C