The Lagoon

We have a room in our house that I believe was once a porch, but has been enclosed with walls and windows.  It's 10' x 11', and in that space there are eight windows, so we called it the sunroom.  Because we hardly ever use our front door, the sunroom is the room where we always enter the house, with our dirty feet and paws.  And although the rest of the house is hardwood (except for the tiled bathroom), the sunroom had carpet--indoor/outdoor, used-to-be-blue, disgusting, old, smelly carpet.

I HATED the carpet. 

So a few months back, I contacted our landlord to ask for permission to pull up the carpet and paint the concrete floor beneath.  She happily obliged, and when I promised not to go too crazy with the color, didn't seem bothered, telling me that she could always put down carpet again after we move if it's ugly.  Excellent.

But then I'd waver, trying to decide if the amount of work I'd have to do to pull up the carpet would be worth it.  The project was one of the things on my summer to-do list, but I knew it was a lofty goal, and didn't actually think I'd get around to it.

And then one night I talked to Becky, who is in the process of buying a house, and our conversation revolved around home renovations, decorating, and DIY projects.  And I was inspired.  The next morning when I woke up the very first thing I thought about was that ugly-ass carpet, and I was motivated. 

And after five trips to Home Depot, $86, several conversations with Larry the Home Depot Floor Expert, blood blisters, sore backs, and a few days of hard, miserable work, I did it. 

But let's back up. 

Since I got to pick the color myself, I had a big decision to make.  I wanted something fun, something dark enough that it wouldn't show every speck of dirt, but light enough that it wouldn't show dog hair.  And I couldn't help but to come back to these tea towels that Matt's mom got me for Christmas.  (They're some of the nice towels in the kitchen, and I almost don't want to use them because they're so pretty.)

And on trip #1 to Home Depot, I saw that Ms. Martha had her own line of paint colors.  Basically, I chose the color that matched up best with the towels, Lagoon.

But there was a lot of work to do.

There was the initial pulling up of the carpet, and then the scraping of foam.  Easy enough.  I did it with Matt's grill scraper.  (He was at the movies when I turned into a home-renovating psychopath.)

But then there was this glue, this carpet glue that had been there for decades.  It wasn't going to come up easily.  I used chemicals, and I used boiling water, and I used 4" razor blades, and I used a hair dryer.  That glue can rot in hell as far as I'm concerned. 

After about two days of glue removing misery, we were done.  (Matt helped after I stood in the middle of the room, sweating like crazy and almost in tears, cussing at the glue and holding my sore wrist.)

And then I primed.

And then painted.

And I bought a rug. (for $10--hell yeah, Marshalls!)

And moved in some items from around the house.

And now look!

And now it's my new favorite room in the house, and it makes me smile every time I walk [swim] into it. 

Here's a little side-by-side comparison.

I'm in love.