Getting rid of my husband. :D

... sorry, couldn't resist.

In this house so far it's been covering up my WHITE kitchen floor with Novalis vinyl "wood" planks in medium oak. The stuff is fabulous in that it's easy to clean and it doesn't show dirt. It was easy to lay too.

When I was younger I was a floor snob and hated vinyl. Now that I realize I hate housework more, I like the stuff.

Mine was painting the dark kitchen cabinets (not a pretty dark either!) a fresh white and replacing the hardware- they look brand new, and that was 5 years ago!

Replacing most of the carpet with Pergo. So much easier to care for, especially with 4 pooches.

Pulling out carpet, replacing with hardwood.

Red

LOL, Oceanna! I second Red, pulling out all of the carpet downstairs and putting in hardwood floors. I wish I could afford to do it upstairs!

Jana

LOL Oceanna!

I think the kitchen floor. Two shades of commercial grade vinyl tile, one a light creamy beige and the other a richer coffee with a bit of cream color, set on the diagonal. That floor makes me smile every time I come downstairs or look down the stairs as I walk by in the upstairs hall, and it has been down for a number of years.

Ripping out the carpet to reveal the oak floors beneath. Second was to paint the bedroom ceiling antique gold.

Oceanna...I'm not familiar with that product, is it sheet vinyl? We put down gorgeous vinyl that looks like wood, everyone is fooled. Problem is we had a minor fire in the stove and the stove racks were dropped on the floor, melting to the floor beneath.

A well placed rug is covering the spot until we reno the entire kitchen and redo floors again. I think I'll switch to tile.

In first place is putting down a porcelain tile floor (16" tiles) throughout the foyer, family room, kitchen and two bathrooms. All except in bathrooms is laid on the diagonal.

Adding six large skylights (when we replaced our wood shingle roof with a Spanish tile one) comes a close second.

Let's see:

1) Painting the outside of the house -- in 93 -- in a fresh cream (from dark brown that dominated the whole neighhourhood) -- strangers actually stopped outside the house and told us how much they liked the change -- and then LOTS of people around here painted their own homes! We just re-painted last year to a darker rich sage green ..... and people liked that color too! LOL!

2) Painting ALL of the dark woodwork in the WHOLE interior of this house -- in 93 -- from brown to bright fresh white. Shocked a LOT of visitors when they walked in!

3) Replacing a USELESS window in the master bedroom with a door AND a screen door. Now the master bedroom has a walk-out to the patio and pool area. ((idiot builders ......!))

4) Adding a small but useful wine storage cubby in the breakfast bar in the kitchen ((idiot builders that waste space!!))

5) Got California Closets to build custom shelving for our office/guestroom closet. Now we have a closet that actually has well-used storage from top to bottom. Worth every cent!

6) We turned out garage into our storage center for our EBay business ..... so we added a a two-car steel carport for our cars. Very important for the interesting weather patterns that we have in Dallas. Worth every cent!

7) Buying several small measuring tapes so that I always have one in my purse. Priceless.

Has to be getting rid of all our carpet for wood. I will never have carpet again!!

Every stick of wood in this house was stained even kit cab.
Had everything that didn't move painted white.

Oh, my, it looked like walking into a cloud.

When I had my master bath built onto my MB I chose white
vinyl that looks like tile.
I love it. It is sooo easy to keep.

My best and last was taking a room that was going to be a big walk in closet and making my computer room. This is my
quiet place.

Pesky, oh what a shame!

Yes, it's vinyl plank. It was super duper easy to lay, just peel and stick. I put it on top of my old vinyl floor which was in very good shape, just a stupid color (white with a bit of mottled beige so it looked dirty ALL the time). The price is great too. Several folks on the flooring forum have it and love it and a few have put it through their entire house.

Here's a pic:

{{!gwi}}

Now let me ask you all -- would you dare put that all through your LR and down your hall? When the guy set the table on it he was shocked when I told him it is vinyl. I'm SO tempted because I can do it myself and afford it and it's such an easy keeper. What say you all?

Here is a link for you.

Here is a link that might be useful: Novalis plank flooring

Biting the bullet and getting our first choice for granite in our kitchen, Volga Blue.

Adding glass ball lamps to the family room (but with more modern drum lamp shades and round silver bases and silver finials since my family room is very modern looking) and adding crystal lamps to my bedroom (but with crystal bases and crystal finials beside my bed and crystal lamps on my dresser) was a great decision thanks to this decorating site. I love how it makes my room so calm and peaceful.

I also like the decorating decision I made to take a chance on walls darker than I am used to and painted my family room, kitchen, and upstairs hallway all BM Bone with in the Pearl Finish. The color is so warm and just goes so well with everything and really warms up the room. Also adding the Extra White Trim really helped finish off my rooms.

I also like the decorating decision I made of going with ivory, off-white and creams in my Master Bedroom since it is calming and I need calm in my life with all the stress going on right now around me.

Finally the decorating decision of getting a French Door Refrigerator was the right thing to do for my little kitchen since now I do not have to move a chair every time I open a refrigerator door.

Of course, I have made bad decisions also that I still regret...

Wellllll....paying off loan and credit card debt, making mortgage payments that were more than was required, and making a special MEGA mortgage payment that reduced the interest by a shocking amount and pays off the house sooner translates to the best decorating decisions we made because...we can now carry out many of our rehabbing and decorating ideas for the house without getting physically sick about finances : ) BUT I don't think that's really what the OP was asking....so I'll say that it was removing the carpeting to reveal the wood floors.

Like Kim, paying off the house early has brought the MOST peace of mind to our lives and opened up many choices for us.

But what I did today was pretty cool...we had to take down everything on our walls in the FR (major furniture rearrangement due to the big screen Tv Santa brought us) and when we rehung everything in the new places, we were left with some unsightly holes in the wall. I don't spackle well...had no interest in paint touch-ups, especially since the FR is about a yr away from getting repainted...so I went to Pier One and Kirklands and got some cheap (but cool) metal wall art and put that over the holes to hide them. It's fantastic. : )
Susan

My biggest improvements has been replacing windows and doors with much better ones. They needed to be replaced so I paid extra to upgrade with bow windows, transom windows and much better doors. I have been doing it slowly because they are expensive. Hopefully, I will get to the second floor in 2009.

I just think that windows add so much. It is one of the first things I notice when I walk into a room.

I seems like everyone who ditched their carpets are very happy with their choices. I'm down to having just 3 rooms of carpet left to replace. When I put carpet out on the curb for bulk pick-up I just know all my neighbors are wondering "what is she doing now?".

My best decision has to be doing the painting on my own. I love being able to just pick up a can of paint and changing the whole personality of a room in a day. I can do it on my schedule and don't have to wait for anyone. Instant gratification!

When I built I put in wood floors in the main level and master bedroom. Now we're looking to add them to the rest of the bedrooms and the whole game room level of the house. Wow, it will be expensive but I can't wait. I love my wood floors and hate my carpeting. Seems like I have lots of company here on this post. I just enjoy looking at my wood floors and the natural variations as well as how much easier thay are to keep clean.

Sky

In the previous house, it was tearing out horrible carpet (carpet is evil!) and putting in honey ash hardwood, and redoing the master bath into something I really loved instead of cheaper Plastic Fantastic, even though I didn't get to enjoy it for very long. In this house, so far it's been replacing too-small area rugs with new, pretty ones that fit the rooms properly, and turning a waste-of-space dining room into a sitting room (although it's only about 10% done!).

Hardwood floors, old-style trimwork on windows and doors, almost-true-divided-lite windows ("simulated true divided lite" but they look good), taller baseboards. Laminate instead of granite in the kitchen (granite is beautiful, but not worth the cost to us).

I used to literally dream of having wood under the carpet in my old house, but alas no such good fortune (believe me, I checked!)

Having hardwood installed in the entry, LR, DR, hall and kitchen.

Installing a skylight in our windowless kitchen and our windowless bathroom.

Replacing a 6-foot sliding patio door and 2 windows, all on the same wall in the family room, with one 12-foot, triple sliding patio door.

For me it was the re-doing of our bedroom- we have a habit of starting things and taking a year to finish- when we did the bedroom, I told my husband we had to be weekend warrios and had to be done in 2 days.
Well, we painted,a sage green, replaced all the woodwork, while my husband was doing that, went to wallpaper store, picked out border in sale bin, (which was absolutey gorgeous), got a new comforter and pictures, everything was hung the next day. The only thing we waited for was new carpeting that the following week, replaced the closet doors and it was done. Its my favorite room in the house now and best thing its all finished.

Oceanna--I love your floor. I've just bookmarked the link and will have a look around. I love the look of wood, however, cannot afford to do the entire house in it. I hate carpet especially with 2 dogs.

Marcia, glad I could help. That's me too. I recently went from five dogs to three. I'll always have dogs. Even well trained dogs can do some unmentionable things to carpets, not to mention tracking in a lot of dirt that settles down into the padding. I'm seriously thinking about putting this floor throughout the upper floor -- and I keep asking but don't get much feedback on it. Money is an issue here too and it was very inexpensive to do my kitchen. I love wood too -- it's so warm.

Keep us posted please. I'd love to know if you do it and if you like it.

Hopefully in 2009, I will be able to invest to remove the carpet in my home office. The carpet is over 17 years old and now even with steam cleaning it a few times a year, it is starting to look under the weather. Under the carpet is cement so it will be a costly job as well as needing a lot of strong people to move the 5 drawer file cabinets and Supply cabinets in my office as well as the furniture.