Updating My Stairs
Monday, March 5, 2012 It occurred to me recently that I have a runner going up my stairs made of a color and of a carpet that I don’t like. It was here, in this house, when we moved in and we’ve kept it because we had young babies going up and down the stairs. Now that my girls are older, I have grown tired of looking at this carpet and wondered if it was contributing to the overall dismal look of the staircase. So, it was time to take it off!
Oh the humanity! Look at that carpet (and nevermind that purple painted banister).
My poor husband literally didn’t even have a chance to protest. I said, do you have a crowbar and pliers (to which he crooked his eyebrow; he knew I was up to something). Then I filled him with all of the reasons why this carpet had to go... now. So we began to pull and tug and rip and curse.
We noticed how the carpet installers had decided to use about 50 staples in one spot and it wasn’t due to their fear of the carpet coming loose but yet they were probably just forgetful that they had already stapled in that same spot 49 times prior... probably. Once the carpet was pulled off of the 21 stairs, we noticed many of the staples and much of the carpet frizz still stayed, leaving huge tears in the molding. But boy did those stairs look beautiful! To my pleasure, the lovely, honeyed wood was in great condition and looked like it had just been polished yesterday.
Nothing like sharing a project when it's still in progress, but I think it's only looking up from here.
Now we need to replace the molding and repaint the faces of the stairs white. But that will come when we begin to repaint the rest of the house interior this spring. Now, I will enjoy my updated stairs and their creaks have become music to my ears (dont' you just love an old house!).
Pulling out those staples and left behind carpet was sooo much fun.
And that’s how we spent a Saturday afternoon. What about you?
Reader Comments (1)
Looks great. We did the exact opposite! We put a runner on our bare stairs. Something I never even thought of until we were actually living in the house was the volume of the footsteps on the stairs.