This past year was our first time, and although it's behind schedule, and we're about to be kicked out of our rental (our landlady has another tenant coming in and didn't count on us this far behind schedule), I would definitely do it again. Some things that helped make it "enjoyable": 1. We had a great builder - honest, knowledgeable, and very communicative (although the one time he made an assumption without consulting us, he ended up eating the cost to rip out the built-in as we wanted stain grade wood). 2. We worked with our builder in more of a partnership model. For example, he couldn't find enough of the gimbaled LED lights from his supply sources and I looked it up online and found which Home Depot stores had what, and we split up and each went to various one to pick up enough quantity needed (we needed 25, and the word was that the manufacturer had some issues at the plant, and it would be awhile to get these same ones restocked). In other times, he worked with us to redesign something that he didn't like or didn't fit what the architect drew out. 3. I work from home most days, and have a flexible schedule as well as mobile technology that allows me to work anywhere. Our rental is about a mile away from the site, so I could pop in and out as needed to answer questions on site when the builder wasn't there or if he didn't know the answer, check in daily to watch progress and catch errors (of course, the one big one that I didn't catch ended up costing over $20K extra after the fact). 4. Had a positive attitude going in, along with a network of people to bounce ideas and questions off of here and on houzz. I felt that there were no issues that couldn't be solved with everyone here. I may have overanalyzed things and may have been paralyzed many times, but somehow got through it. 5. knowing ahead of time that things happen, and taking the position that sometimes you just have to roll with it and make adjustments in real time. This is more of the attitude readjustment. 6. planning ahead - know what are the critical decisions that need to be made and when, and then a month ahead of time, do your research and education so you can make the right decision. Nothing more stressful than having a short time to make a decision because someone needs it the next day. 7. have a set of "guiding principles" for those times when things fall outside of the norm - when something is unavailable, when something got done wrong and something needs to be altered, when there is too much choices available, etc. Those guiding principles will guide you back - for example, when looking for an entry light (an easy decision, right?), we were overwhelmed with choices, and we had to go back to what was the look we wanted (not necessary the light, but the look) and then use that to remind ourselves to stay on track. 8. enjoy the experience. If you go into it with dread and trepidation, it's going to turn out that way. Enjoying the experience doesn't mean that there isn't going to be bad days and trying time, conflicts, etc., but by and large, remember to treat it as a positive experience. Hope that helps.

You can get an engineered floor that is as good if not better than a solid product. We produce solid unfinished flooring but we also produce unfinished engineered flooring as well. Solid flooring typically has a 1/4" (6mm) of "sandable" or "usable" surface. Basically after you get 1/4" deep you'll hit the nail heads and so you can't sand below that point. Our engineered unfinished product has a 5mm wear layer. However, the engineered product is already pre-sanded to 80g which means once installed the amount of sanding that takes place is minimal. On a solid floor, most contractors will need to do a rough sanding to get the floor even, then one or two more cuts to get it smooth. Even if you have a very talented sander he is going to take 1/32 off in his sanding on the solid floor. That equates to roughly 3/100 which is nearly the difference between the 6mm and 5mm usable surfaces we began with. So in essence, you are getting very close to the same "usable" surface. Not to mention the engineered is more stable, will keep you from having to install a subfloor as it can be glued directly to concrete, eliminates transition issues between hardwood and tile or carpet AND should take less time to install. My two cents. Sam @ Real Wood Floors realwoodfloors.com

As Mightyanvil pointed out earlier, whatever system is used for setting prices has to be quick and easy. It also has to be transparent, and all of these qualities are necessary so that adjustments can be made along the way without the larger project getting bogged down in exactly the sorts of negotiations you say you don't like. In the abstract, there are reasons for both contractors and consumers to want a pricing system that accurately reflects the actual costs (in time, effort, materials, risks, etc) associated with each line-item of a given project. But your house is not a Big Mac or a Toyota. The myriad unpredictabilities of remodeling make such accuracy of foresight impossible, and the fact that a given project has a great many line-items means that things tend to average out anyhow, so that the utility of this fantasy pricing system is pretty much nil. Yes, there are times when the system doesn't make sense. A brief appeal to common sense is usually all the negotiation that's necessary to improve such a situation, but one has to remember that for every solid-gold countertop installation, there's a fifty cent light switch that's installed incorrectly and burns the house down, at which point the electrician who installed it skips town and leaves the GC on the hook. As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain, and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality. -- Albert Einstein

There is no chance of us redoing the floors. They were done only a short time ago and are of good quality. While I may not have chosen them myself, we do like them and they work with the ceiling and will be great for not scratching from sand brought in on bare feet. Cabins in our area come at a premium. The square footage cost is 5 times that of the square footage cost to build our home again and they often go into bidding wars. So you can understand that we have a very limited budget to make it our own after the purchase. That's why we feel so fortunate that the previous owner looked after things so well and took pride in maintaining their vacation property so that we're at least not having to put money into maintenance issues. Most properties we had looked at had a ton of maintenance issues to contend with first. Since the floors and ceiling work well together, that's why we thought painting the walls for a more lake house look and addressing the kitchen cabinet fronts to "demodernize" them were our best options to start for our three season get away. We will definitely put one good sized area rug in the living area, but with everyone coming up from the dock/beach all day long, a ton of rugs won't work well. If I paint, would SW Alabaster work in the living/dining area with the warm wood ceiling, fireplace and northwest daylight? Or do you have other suggestions for a paint color? And do you like the rugs in my links? jjam you said go light. They're light with a touch of navy, but washed out vintage like. I've attached the links again below. What do you think? Thank you to everyone for trying to make this an extra special place for my family... Possible rug? Another possibility? Rug with soft colors - have one in my home Much lighter than appears in picture