Before and After

One of the first projects we took on in our first home was to refinish the hardwood floors.  I have a little experience refinishing but nothing as big as hardwood floors.   We did a little research and headed to the rental store to get a drum sander.  The sales associate Bill was worried that we might damage our floors with the drum sander and suggested that we try an orbiter sander, he said " so easy even a girl could use it".  Since I had never done this before and he seemed to be the experienced one I took his advice.  As soon as we got home we plugged it in and got to work, five minutes later we had to stop.  The sandpaper discs were loading up with the old poly.  I continued on like this the rest of the evening, changing the discs every five minutes with the plan of going to talk to Bill first thing in the morning.  Bill assured me that I was doing the right thing and the only thing that I could do was to " keep on doing what I was doing".  I asked again about the drum sander because at the rate I was going I would be sanding for weeks.  Again he advised against it, so I went home and got back to work.  After an hour I came to the conclusion that Bill didn't know what the heck he was talking about and back to the rental store I went to get a drum sander.  By the time I got there the last drum sander was rented just fifteen minutes before I got there.  So I had to drive thirty minutes to another store that had one.  Once I finally plugged this thing in I was so nervous that I would damage the floors.  I couldn't believe it, all it took was once over and I was down to bare wood.  It was easier, faster,  and I wasn't making big grooves in it like Bill had warned about.  As you can see they turned out beautifully and I am so proud to say we did it ourselves. We stained them a dark walnut to cover up a water stain that was in the foyer.