I second the suggestion for the waterhog mats. I'll post where we purchase them if I can find the link - you can get custom sizes, colors, styles, etc. LL BEAN sells them too but they are very pricey IMO. We use them around our dogs water bowls too since they are sloppy drinkers. In addition to our entry way, we also use them in the back of our SUV's in the cargo area since we travel with our Boxers. Keeps the truck nice and clean and absorbs liquids. After my dog had surgery he peed in the truck on the drive home from the vets office (post-anesthesia, if I remember correctly) and I was thankful for that waterhog mat. Not a drop of urine on my upholstery; the waterhog captured all of it, and it was easy enough to clean -- I sprayed it down with a hose and some cleaning solution, left it out to dry and no residual smell whatsoever. They're awesome mats.

I must admit I don't bother washing our wood floors, preferring to spot clean with Pledge MultiSurface wipes. We have Swedish finished oak floors and when I have an area that needs a deep clean I use mineral spirits, applied with clean, old white tees. It really cleans well and leaves a nice shine, without making the floor too slick. You will need to do a test on your particular flooring to make certain the spirits won't lift the finish. (Pick an out of the way corner and use a clean white rag - rub gently with a circular motion. If you see any of the floor's coloring on the rag then don't use the mineral spirits. Or if you have a spare piece of flooring somewhere you can use that as a test board.) Make certain the room you're working in is well ventilated - I always work with a window or door open.

Yeah one finished room. (Of course still full of dust) They finished our bedroom yesterday. Still have to enventually come back and do the closet, but for now have moved on to the great room. camlan..Their doing the same thing here. Running the wood with no seams from room to room. I hope ours eventually "glow" right now they just glow of dust, but it still is looking nice. judydel. I like to buy rugs at TJ Max HomeGoods. Patty Cakes.. Oh no. The stairs is what inspired us to do this hardwood job. We just finished painting the stairs yesterday. The carpet that was on the stairs was old, dirty and ugly. It had to come up. My kids are teenagers, so hopefully safety wont be an issue. We'll see if they become too loud, etc., we can always eventually add a runner to them. beth..Your floors, rugs and house are beautiful. Thanks for sharing the photos and experience. work.. Thanks for the advice. I'll remember this for the near future. Id love a sweeper I could run on the floor and not have to worry about damage.

Wood vs. Engineered Wood? No contest in this case. If the home was built in 1905, put real hardwood in. This preserves the integrity of the home's building materials. Plus, as you can see from the age of these floors, higher grades (i.e. thicker) hardwood can be sanded several times; you usually don't get even one chance to sand engineered wood. The hardwood layer at the top of this multilayered product is simply too thin. Level Floors and Subfloors There are ways to level a subfloor, ranging from replacing parts of the subfloor with thicker or thinner sheets of plywood (or planks, see below), to pour-on leveling compounds that harden to make the entire floor level. What you use to level uneven areas depends on what the subflooring is. If it is plywood or concrete, the compound works. But more likely with this home, on floors at or above grade, there will be wood planks laid at a diagonal across the floor joists. So in your home, the layers were probably joists first, then subfloor planks of wood, then hardwood with tongue & groove joints. You cannot effectively use a pour-on leveling compound on a plank subfloor, as there are cracks between the planks. However, you can lay a new hardwood floor directly on a wood plank subfloor as long as those planks are sound and relatively level. Replace individual planks that have been damaged by water or insects, are otherwise compromised, or even missing (it happens!), with either new planks of lumber, or with plywood of the same thickness as the planks. Any lumber you install, for either the subfloor or finished flooring, should be brought in to your home several days prior to installation, so the materials acclimatize to your typical interior temperature and humidity. Unlike for ceramic or porcelain tile, the subfloor does not have to be perfectly level. And unlike vinyl sheeting, planks or tiles, the hardwood won't "telegraph" minor differences in height, and minor surface irregularities, so the subfloor doesn't have to be absolutely perfect; it should be sound, strong, uniform and essentially level. Your flooring contractor can give you specifics on what upgrades your subfloor may need once the original hardwood is removed. Joists If the floor is significantly not level in parts, or if certain areas feel spongy when you walk on them, I recommend you have your flooring contractor, a home inspector, or structural engineer inspect the subflooring and especially the floor joists. You don't want to invest in a new floor, only to have it become damaged because some joists weren't attended to. Transitions Transitions (a.k.a. thresholds or molding) between existing rooms and the new floor ought to be made of the same wood and same finish (stain, polyurethane, etc.) as the new flooring you are putting down. As wood ages, the finish becomes darker, so trying to make the transitions match the finishes of existing floors is very difficult and not recommended (what will match those floors right now won't match later after your transitions age up a bit). Eventually, the transitions wouldn't match either the new or the old floors! Transitions come in four types: reducer (when the two floors being joined are of different heights), seam binder (when the floors are the same height, and the boards from each are very close to one another), T-mold (when the two floors are the same height, but there is a crack between the two rooms' flooring) and stair nose or stair edger (when the flooring needs to curve around the front of a stair's "tread"--the flat part of a stair upon which you tread!). The transitions for your particular project can be ordered when you order the hardwood, so make sure to include measurements for those doorways/entrances. The contractor can tell you if he/she anticipates there will be a height difference or gap between the floorings, which would require those particular transitions. Dry Air Concerns Consult a local lumber supplier or flooring contractor familiar with your local climate conditions to discuss finishes or other tips for keeping your wood floors healthy in the dry winters. Sounds wonderful! Have fun!