First-time house renovation

Hi guys and gals, I'm back with a question about flooring. I seem to have sort of got a promise off my son that he can fit us in during May but to be honest I'm not holding my breath! But I'm determined to get the sun room floor levelled and with some kind of flooring on this year considering it's been almost two years since we moved in.

Anyway, it's been a while since I've had to make any big decisions so I'm out of practice so please help me with any opinions or advice or suggestions.

The kitchen/sun room is open plan in an L-shape. You can see it here, pics 5 & 6. The original tiles in the sun room are still down. A couple are blown. The floor will have to be levelled before we do anything. I can't stand the thought of all the mess of taking up the tiles so not sure if it can be levelled over them?????

This is the vinyl we have down in the kitchen part, pics 5 & 6. And here is a closer pic of the vinyl and another one.

The sun room has two doors, one to the garden and one to the side yard which leads to the pedestrian lane. The side door is used most as we tend to use it to enter/exit the house. We have a small dog so there's much to-ing and fro-ing and wet paws.

Now I'm wondering whether to go for carpet tiles - this was our first choice, some decent ones like Heuga but they are expensive. Also thinking will get dirty from doggie paws and not easy to clean.

Then thought of laminate/wood flooring. Which is best and why? We have no experience of this type of flooring. Also what colour would go best with the vinyl as it will butt up against it where the kitchen cupboards end.

I did see this one on B & Q site which took my eye TouchLOC Legacy Oak effect (first one on the page). Would this one blend in with the vinyl? I haven't seen it in the flesh yet - can't get to B & Q which is 60 miles away and we have a very car sicky dog.

Third option is to see if we can get some more of the same vinyl and put a joining strip where the two lots meet. I was thinking that the vinyl would be a bit dark for the sun room but whatever we have we will buy a large rug to make it more comfy underfoot. Some pics of how much light comes into the sun room here which were taken during the renovation.

Sorry for long post. Please let me know what you think. We really do need to get this sorted this year, this is one of those jobs I don't want to be left with on my own if OH takes a turn for the worst. This has been in the planning stage for two years and it's completely done my head in, my brain's turned to mush and I can't think straight enough to make a decision any more :rotfl: .

Andy Oh my goodness, that's not long! You're either very nervous or very excited!!!!!!!!!! Plan looks fine but if you're not sure you can always play around and rearrange if you can get someone to help hump the furniture about.

Day of it today, removed the old utility room cupboards, skirting boards, had to take the sink out in there and i must have been sleeping this morning, turned off the mains but completely forgot to drain the ot water cylinder, undone the nut on the pipe an several minutes f scolding hot water pumping out over the floor, me flapping aroud like a demented bird!!!! managed to get the nut done up but burnt my hands in the process but could ahve been worse, still makes me go funny thinking how much damage the water could have done!

took the old coving off too, which was surprisingly well stuck on! spoke to my electrician ad hes booked for next saturday.

Also had a driveway guy round, to hot tar and gravel it would cost about £1500 and then to block pave its about £4350, he worked it out to be aboout 8m2,, so will have to see if thats a good price....

got back ache now...............................

andrew-b wrote: »

Stolt, you know you don't actually have to empty the hot cylinder..just isolate the cold feed from tank to cylinder which usually has a gate valve..you'd still lose a small amount of water but nowhere near as much bit late now but useful for future reference (when i was tee-ing into the hot supply for shower the gate valve let-by so i still got wet ..didn't have time to hang about and got quite wet!.

hi, yeah i knew there must have been a way around it, didnt even go in the loft i was too busy running around in circles not knowing what i was going to do!!!!!! cheers will keep it in mind...knew i should have done some reading up on it the night before..:)

andrew-b wrote: »

gate valve for cold feed to our hot cylinder is in the airing cupboard... so may be no need to go up the loft.

i'll have alook tomorrow just for educaional purposes, there are some other gatevalves in the airing cupboard, there four gatevalves in there, one is a 'stop valve cold water water' and one next to that that has no tag on it, on the other side there 'shower stop valve' again another pipe has no tag....

Just wanted to pop in to say hello to everyone and to wish you the best with your projects.

Stolt, I'm afraid my head is spinning with the technicalities of it all - the pretty, pink bedroom and wallpaper issues were more up my street. Andy, just a couple of weeks! I'm getting excited myself. All the very, very best. Diable, that bathroom looks gorgeous; very spa-like. What bath have you got? It looks much like mine - carronite matrix. TomsMum, I think keeping the flooring the same as the kitchen would look better in some respects but I agree that it is a little on the dark side. Your idea of having rugs is good and you could use washable ones in light colours.

Maggie hasn't been around for a long time; I wonder if she is busy moving in? I think I'm almost getting there - six months, and I expected less than three. My fireplace is being installed on Friday, having ordered it last November, and as long as my builder has kept to his promise and seen to all the items on my very long list over the last couple of days then it will just be the door handles and the last bit of the decorating (except for the doors, architrave and skirting in the kitchen/utility, which my builder says would be better going on after the vinyl's laid, and the sun tube - but that's another story - and of course the external making good round windows and front door. Probably more too which just escapes me at the moment ...... mmmm, not exactly finished, is it? :eek:).

And once this is all over I have the pleasure of contemplating the front drive and sideway, the fencing, removal of asbestos garage, new shed, rotavating and laying new turf and conjuring up a garden. I feel worn out just typing the words.

Hope x