Kevin, that beautiful bathroom of yours has a flaw? Thank you for helping me keep this in perspective. Unfortunately, whatever is on my floor is not isolated to a small area. BTW- can't wait to see what you do with those chairs! Annemouse, I hope, hope, hope your solution is our solution! GC was here at 8am. I am so thankful we are not acting as our own GC on this project. First glance he thinks it is improperly applied sealer and can be rectified with solution similar to annemouse above. The owner of the tile company is here now to look at this as well as the spotting issue on the grout in the hall bath. I can hear him rubbing the floor above. Unnerving! Will post "solutions" as they are implemented in the event anyone ever encounters the same issues. Thank you.

Thankyou for your comment, sj. I have seen lots of people on the web with the same question I had, how can I seal prefinished hardwood floors. And all the responses are invariably, either 1. Why would you want to Seal it, don’t do it. 2. Just clean up any spills immediately. Or 3. Install a different type of flooring. there are many good reasons for wanting to seal a prefinished hardwood floor. Especially if you have kids and or pets. Maybe you bought a house with the floors already and now you want to seal them. Maybe you installed the floor before you had wet puddle makers. Maybe your significant other likes the glassy look of uv cured 7 layer factory finished floors. Maybe you like how durable the finish is. Small Kids and any size pets usually don’t tell you when they’ve left a puddle of pee, poop, vomit, orange Juice, and or a pile of quickly melting Ben and Jerry’s cherry garcia ice cream. Nope, you just have to stumble upon it. At which point it has already soaked to the bottom of the board, possibly the subfloor depending on whether you Put a barrier of some sort. And unless you have a way of getting the urine smell out of the space between your boards, or you enjoy scraping poop and vomit out of the larger gaps with an old toothbrush, you are going to want to seal it. yes it does add significant time to your installation, probably 5-10% of the time you spent on the whole installation. Which is significant, cost wise maybe 1% of the total cost, so pretty much negligible. Time wise you will regain a lot of that by the reduction in the amount of time you spend cleaning. im glad you brought that up, so I could get that chip off my shoulder! Aloha!

The cost to refinish marble countertops will be based on size,condition of stone(how severe is the scracthing, etching and or staining,cracks,chips,etc)type of stone(darker stones and some limestones can be tricky to refinish)time and materials. Special pricing if we change the finish from polished to honed(easier and reasonably priced) or honed to polished(which is impossible to do to granite on site- very-difficult to do on marble(can be pricey). Our pricing on an average kitchen(60-80sqft) with normal wear and etching will start at around $650.00 and up. Larger kitchens with multiple islands and multiple countertops and other areas over 100 sq ft can that can be done in a day will start $900.00 and up. Pricing will vary region to region. Stone refinishing is one of those trades where experience is very important. I have been doing this since 2003 and still learn something everyday. While some stones are easier to work on others can be a serious undertaking. Not to mention the possibility of damaging fixtures back splashes,cabinets etc. Other issues could be dust or water containment and proper masking techniques so appliances,wallpaper,furniture and fabrics are protected . So While I am sure that a very handy person could do or try to refinish the stone there is the question of purchasing and using the proper equipment. I think in the long run it is cheaper to hire a bona -fide refinisher with references. Stu Rosen www.mbstonecare.com www.stoneshine.com

Gotta be careful with heat guns. I have one, and if the application I'm heating is attached to the house I use it on the low setting. Many a house has been burned down with a heat gun. There is the real potential it will blow a smoldering ember into a recessed area that eventually catches fire. I was talking about the quartz bulb infrared paint remover. Doesn't blow any potentially fire starting debris into nooks and crannies. I figured it might be an old apartment building. But I've seen old houses with that many layers of paint too. And always wondered when there was already too much paint on there, why even more was applied. It's not like it looks any better... Peel Away will get really expensive really fast. But, I cannot imagine heat stripping that much paint off of that much wood work. You'll need an assortment of different size scrapers and and arsenal of fresh blades. Because the first four layers of lead paint, the eight layers of non lead oil paint, and the 12 layers of latex paint will dull those blades fast. Before committing to peel away, try Citri Strip. It's a lot less expensive, and you can get it at Home Depot. From my experience it works pretty well.