RenovatorsPlace

Home Improvement Dream: Laminate Flooring

By Candice Mancini
candice.mancini@renovatorsplace.com
Renovators Place Columnist

Before	After

Homeowner Amy Ratto-Parks loves the new laminate floor in her kitchen so much she was excited to talk about it. A teacher and poet, Amy says her renovated floor not only looks beautiful and makes clean up easier, but it also helped her when she was in labor with her second child!

RP: How long have you owned your home?
AR: Five years.

RP: At what point after buying the house did you decide you wanted to have the kitchen floors remodeled?
AR: IMMEDIATELY! When we bought the house, the kitchen had a small section of white linoleum that ran along the edge of the sink, counters and oven, but the rest of the room was covered in blue gray indoor/outdoor carpeting. Not only was it painfully ugly, it was put in quickly, presumably for the sale of the house, and began to pull up and ripple within weeks. In our first years there, we didn't mind because we could remember to negotiate the worst areas of loose carpet. But once we started to talk about having children, we knew the floor would have to go.

Time and money got the best of us and when we had our first child, the ugly floor was still there. But our daughter eventually also learned to plan a strategic course through the kitchen's loose carpet zones. We became comfortable scrubbing baby food (and other less pleasant pet 'products') from the nasty, balling carpet. Although we moaned about it periodically, we never took any action until I got pregnant again. And although I was 8 ½ months into the pregnancy, we finally had a new floor installed.

RP: Were you and your husband in agreement about the renovation?
AR: Oh, yes. We wanted something that was easy to clean up and easy to walk on. And if it matched the hardwood floors in the rest of the house, that was all the better.

RP: Did you hit any home improvement snags along the way?
AR: We weren't expecting so much sawing to go on (or, at least I wasn't). It seemed like that table saw was running non-stop for hours on end just to get started. I had to take my daughter to dinner and a park just to escape the noise. I also didn't expect the sheer blanket of dust that stuck to our walls.

RP: Would you have done anything differently?
AR: Nope.

RP: Did the renovation spark ideas for new renovations?
AR: Of course! We then wanted to refloor the laundry room and the entryway-- essentially, the few remaining patches of the evil carpet or linoleum.

RP: How did you find a contractor?
AR: We were lucky. He's a family friend.

RP: Would you recommend this remodeling project to others?
AR: Definitely. A laminate floor is a must for families with small kids. I used to cringe when I served my kids things like smoothies or yogurt because I could only think of how hard it would be to clean up. But one of our favorite family photos was from the morning after the floor went in and my daughter spilled a whole smoothie. I'd never been so happy to clean up.

RP: Do you have any other home improvement projects planned?
AR: Yes. We're having all new windows and siding installed in a few weeks. We're dying to have a privacy fence and a deck in the backyard, and in a dream world, we would build a new garage/office back there as well.

RP: How did the renovation change the way you view your home?
AR: I have to say that this was the one renovation (of many) we have done to this house that really changed the way we, and other people, feel about it. People have always talked about how open and welcoming the kitchen is, but now, people just stand in the middle of the room and literally turn in circles and just look around. This is especially nice because we have a very modest house, all told, and we love that people like to be in the kitchen.

But also, I delivered my son at home, just weeks after the floor went in, and I spent most of my labor walking around the kitchen. It was May and I remember being so happy to be walking on that cool, smooth floor with my bare feet. Later in labor, when I was sitting on the couch, I remember thinking how much more light the kitchen looked (honestly, it was an easy labor), and how happy it made me to have that project done.

About the Author
Candice Mancini is a writer, a teacher, and a homeowner always on the lookout for a good contractor. She has an M.A. in Education and B.A. in English and history.