My suggestions may not be applicable to your situation. I have dark oak flooring from the 1970's that was supposedly factory-finished except that the finish wasn't very good. So I wax. Try to remove the old wax with an oil-based solvent such as mineral spirits(? I forget what I used) or lacquer thinner. These are pretty bad, so make sure you have adequate ventilation. Your hardware store may have other suggestions. Just get on the floor with the solvent, paper towels, gloves, gentle scrub brush, and trash can. It's easier to control the amount of solvent and cleaning if you clean the floor manually. The paper towels indicate how much junk is left on the floor. Being close to the floor gives you a better idea of how much soil/sand/debris is left. I used to use Johnson's paste wax, which was fine, except that the flooring has a very "rustic" texture which made removing excess wax impossible. The build-up eventually turned yellow. So now I use Bruce "liquid wax with cleaner". It doesn't last as long as paste wax, but the process doesn't take as long. Again, I just get down on the floors, pour and wipe to spread, wait a few minutes, and buff by hand with old terrycloth towels or old socks. I used to use a buffer, but it got too hard to handle as I got older. Plus, the areas next to the wall had to be buffed by hand anyway. Just put yourself in a Zen state. Wax as needed. You can spot wax the areas with heavy traffic. Just don't wax too frequently. Once a year may be enough. HTH

Thank you for your kind words, igloochic. I love rich tones, fabrics and antiques, as well--your plans for your home sound just fabulous; the colors, materials and textures are all rich. Your master bath is the original color scheme I had planned, but as you know--homes tend to have a mind of their own and I wound up with pale blues and greens and travertine in our masterbath, with the richer browns in our bedroom, DH's study and lighter browns in my dressing room. I am visualizing what you've described and it will be gorgeous! I have in my hand a sample of the EK Bronze--EK is Ellen Kennon--an interior designer that makes a line of specialty full spectrum paints, which use many different colors as opposed to just three. Some people can't tell the difference in full spectrum paints and regular paint; many others notice it right away--to me, they look richer and change with the lighting conditions. I used her paints in my new home when we built two and a half years ago--many others here on this forum have used her paints in their homes as well; others make full spectrum paints, too. EK paints have to be ordered through Ellen Kennon's business and she sends the forumla to a local ICI paint dealer. I actually sent Ellen a copy of my house plans, hardcover books and a pair of silk bronze evening slacks--that's what she used to try to make up the bronze color I wanted--isn't that service? www.ellenkennon.com I'm thinking the EK Bronze is probably too light for what you're describing, but I will be happy to send you either a sample of the paint or a card painted with it, if you will email me through Gardenweb. The reason I went with a lighter color she made (a friend--interior designer that helps me with my window treatments--said it looked like the color of Cognac--thus the name!)was the Bronze was too strong for the large space. I still might use it in a small "away" room I'm working on upstairs. EK Mocha is a very rich brown that I used in my DH's study--I don't know if you'd be interested in this. Adobe is a little lighter, but has more bronze tones than the Mocha; Adobe is in our master bedroom. Ellen Kennon will take any color and work with it to make it richer, brighter, muted--whatever you want. I hope you will share photos of your home! Ellen Kennon Mocha:

FWIW, Pugler, we used Waterlox, a much more durable and water-resistant finish, and, since the sink area is "temporary" counter, set the undermount on top for now. As it is, though, we should have put additional coats in the hole for the faucet. There is a thin discolored ring around its edge that would make me uneasy about what we'd have if we had undermounted the sink. Certainly, I doubt mineral oil would have cut it long term without exceptional care. FWIW, our really noticeable problem is where the soap dispenser rises directly from the wood. The soap chemicals from occasional drips and drops not wiped up (DH the big culprit) started penetrating the finish fairly early on. Note that this is mostly a maintenance problem and could have been avoided, or greatly minimized, with greater care, the kind someone using mineral oil might do as a matter of course. Plus, mineral oil can be reapplied very quickly and easily, unlike Waterlox, whose fumes require relocating for a couple days and can't be kept stored for touchups for any length of time. Other options would have been a metal base plate (yuck), or, better choice for us, waiting to build one in because we've always planned to wrap this high-maintenance area with stainless steel eventually anyway. Also BTW, Waterlox has been beautiful and durable on all our non-soap/water counter areas.

All the swaps & orders are done, so this is my tentative legume list for 2016: Beans B.B. Wax (wax)(new trial) Bosnian Pole (snap) Brita's Foot Long (shelly/dry) Cascade Giant (snap)(new trial) Chester (a.k.a. Flagg) (shelly) Emerite (main snap) KY Wonder White #191 (snap) Ma Williams (shelly) Porcelain (a.k.a. Snowcap) (dry) Striped Cornfield (snap/shelly) Tetovac (shelly/dry) Toby Poe's Purple (purple snap)(new trial) Zlatak (wax/shelly) Backups: Woods Mountain Crazy Bean, Poletschka Limas Madagascar Violet's Multi-colored (new trial) Backup: Sieva Runner Beans Aeron Purple Star (new trial) Bianco de Spagna (3rd attempt, hopefully the curse has lifted ;-) Backup: Sunset Peas Mesa (shelling) Nadja (soup) Prebohaty (soup) Purple Pod Parsley (shelling) Rimpaus Green Victoria (soup) Sandy (snow) Sugar Lace II (snap) Cowpeas & Yardlongs Adzuki, Grey Seeded (actually a cowpea)(seed increase & trial) Kirby's Whippoorwill Zipper Cream (new trial) Yardlong, Galante Yardlong, Sierra Madre Yardlong, Yancheng Bush backup: Creel Crowder Misc. legumes Adzuki, Murasaki Chickpea, Brown Popping Garbanzo, PI 359341 Soybeans (E) = edamame Bei 77-6177, Bei Liang 11, Blackeye, GL 2216/84 (E), Grignon 18, Hatsutaka (E), Karikachi 3 (E), Kharkovskaya Zernokormovaya, Manitoba Brown, Oosodefuri (E), PI 194626, PI 437524, PI 522192A, Sac, Selection No. 505, Sioux, Soja Brun Hatif U486, Tai Xing Hei Dou, Zelena Echo 3, Zolta z Zolna The backups are in case of germination failures, or will be grown by collaborators. Only a few new trials this year, I had too much old seed in need of renewal... but a good year for shellies. For a change, sacrilege though it may be, what I'm most looking forward to this year is something other than beans... new pepper trials (including a breeding project I'm pretty excited about) and what looks to be a really good garlic crop. ;-)