One down, five to go

I am sitting here on the couch with my feet up. Six of my fingernails are broken and jagged. My hands are so rough that if I handled pantyhose, the skin on my fingers would put runs in them. I have four bruises on my legs and numerous little cuts. The muscles around my knees are really, really sore and tired. My low back is a little tired and my eyes feel gritty from the sawdust that resulted from all the floor boards that I've cut. My left index fingernail is white from being hit three times (count 'em, THREE times!) with the mallet. But we have a gorgeous floor in one bedroom upstairs. It is the study, and will be used as a hobby or guest room while we live here. It is the room in which I've learned how to lay laminate flooring.
Sam and I started out together working on it, but I discovered rather quickly that unlike me, he doesn't find it terribly exciting work. (I also hatched a new research interest: how do renovation activities impact marriages?!) Doing my own renovation has very different meaning for me than it has for him. To Sam, 'having' to do it ourselves means that we are short on money, because people should be paid to come in and do this. But for me, who grew up where so many homes were over 100 years old and everyone was renovating something, it is just part of life. There is real New England pride in being able to say that you did something yourself. So I have been very eager to get started on this project.
It is a huge project! On Friday we tore up the old carpet and padding in two upstairs guest bedrooms. Sunday we got started putting down the floor following the advice of instructional videos that we found online. Start about two feet out from the far wall and then lay the boards in one at a time until there are two or three rows. Then shove the entire thing up to be plumb with the far walls. Sounded good, but it didn't work that way. We had real difficulty getting the boards to line up. Instead of tapping them into place, we were whaling away at them to get them to fit togehter. There was none of this "clicking the boards into place" kind of thing. It was brute force. After three hours we had only put down three feet of flooring. We were sweating and Sam was at the height of his element.
I called the flooring company. As I was explaining our dilemma to the good man on the phone he stopped short and said, "Is the pounding that I hear what you're doing with the flooring?" He was horrified. "You're going to ruin the boards that way. Bring in a box of your flooring and let's see how we can help you." So I jumped in the car and drove the 30 miles over to Buddy's Flooring Outlet and watched the manager pop all of the boards in my box into place in about three minutes flat. There is a technique that can't be taught and obviously, we didn't know it.
This morning I started in on the floor again, deciding that since I enjoyed it and Sam doesn't, I would happily do it alone at my own speed. Seven hours later, that study is almost done. The boards aren't on the closet floor yet, and I have one little board that needs to be cut with the coping saw to fit around the door jam. The last finishing touch will be the small baseboard round that needs to be nailed where the baseboard meets the flooring.
I am tired but happy. And somewhat overwhelmed at the magnitude of the rest of the job that is waiting. Gladly, I needn't do all the floors at one time, right now. I think I'll aim for the second guest room and the upstairs hallway before I call it quits. I have to go to work next week and I want to get some rest before school starts.
Hurray for do-it-yourself attitudes and efforts!