After years of wear & tear, the wood floor in our kitchen was really starting to look worn. There were some spots by the back door and by the kitchen chairs that were really getting damaged. The stain had worn off completely and the wood was getting really scratched and marred.

We were worried it was getting past the point of repair! Kathy had been complaining about it for some time now.

One year ago, I talked to a couple contractors on the phone and asked them to come take a look at it. Based on the square footage numbers that I gave them, they said it would cost approximately $4,400 to sand it down and re-stain it. But, they said that they would need to come to my house to take measurements and give me a formal estimate. I said "please come!"

Both of them came out and took measurements. They pointed out all the challenges that they would face on this project and told us what a heavy lift this was going to be. They said that, now that they had exact measurements, they would go back to the office to crunch some numbers and send me a formal quote.

However, Kathy and I weren't really very impressed with either of them. And, to my surprise, neither of them got back to me! Every time I tried to find a solution to this problem, I just kept running into one obstacle after another!

I decided to just wait a little longer to see what God had in store for me with this project.

As it turned out, my boy Carson who returned from a mission in Guatemala six months ago had a couple friends of his from Guatemala who were looking for work. His friends, Carlos and David, are really great guys. They don't speak a lick of English. But, they're hard workers and were really happy to give our floor project a go.

So, we decided to give it the old college try.

I rented a large walk-behind floor sander and a couple hand and edge sanders. We moved all the furniture off the floor (Ugh). Then, we hung plastic everywhere to try to contain the sawdust.

When I rented the sander, the lady at the rental store said "you must be careful with this walk-behind floor sander. You can't use it like a vacuum or it will create these divots in your floor. When you push it forward, you can't just pull it back again. Otherwise, it will create a divot in the furthest most point. Instead, you must use this lever to lift the sander." I explained this to the Guatemalans when I got home and we started sanding.

The house was chaos with furniture and plastic everywhere. Dust filled the air to the point that it was hard to breath. The noise from the sanders was surprisingly loud (even with my noise cancelling AirPods). Keeping the dog off the floor was a hassle. And, I wasn't feeling well. But, as they sanded, the floor started to look pretty darn good!

They finished sanding the next day. So, I hurried to return the sanders that I had rented and got them back to the store right at the 24 hour mark which was great! I was starting to think that maybe we could actually do this project on our own after all!

As I returned the sanders, Team Guatemala swept and vacuumed the saw dust. They cleaned the floor and then removed the plastic that was covering everything. Then, they cleaned some more! While they were doing that I ran to Salt Lake City to buy the primer and stain.

When I got back, it was time for the moment of truth! I observed with great excitement as the Guatemalans painted the first coat of primer on a 10x10 foot area of the floor in the foyer by the front door.

The floor looked beautiful...until it didn't.

As the primer went on, these divots started to appear...EVERYWHERE!! NOOOOOOO!!!!!!

Before putting on the primer, the divots were invisible. You couldn't see them at all! But, once the primer went on, they popped and you couldn't NOT see them. Oh no!!

Kathy wasn't home so I couldn't ask her what she thought of it. We had already removed the plastic and cleaned up all the saw dust so it would be hard to backtrack now. My stomach was hurting more. I was really starting to feel sick so it was hard to think clearly. But, I took another look at the floor and realized that there was no way we could live with those divots everywhere. Why go through all this hassle only to have a really stupid looking floor!

So, since it was the end of the day, I sent the Guatemalans home and told them to come back the next day ready to sand again.

The next morning, I was so ill that I couldn't get out of bed. So, Kathy ran to the store to rent the hand sanders again and I told the Guatemalans to sand out all the divots. You couldn't see them with the naked eye. But, you could feel them. So, I told them to go around the room on their hands and knees and to put blue masking tape on every divot.

I told them not to bother putting up the plastic again. Ain't no time fo dat. This was just a little touch-up work. Haha...yeah right.

They sanded all. day. long. as I laid in bed feeling sicker than a dog. The house was completely filled with sawdust. Yuck!

When they finally finished sanding , we cleaned up and applied the first coat of primer and...(drum roll please)...the floor looked great!!!

We waited a few hours and then we applied the first coat of the stain.

The next morning, we applied the second coat of the stain. And, that evening, we applied a third coat of the stain.

The next day, we moved all of the furniture back into the room and cleaned the whole house. It took all day to do it but BOY was it nice when we were done!

Here is a quick video that I shot of Kathy and my grandson sitting on our new kitchen floor.


When everything was said and done, it cost me less than half as much as the two contractors estimated. And, the Guatemalans did much more than the contractors would have done. For example, the contractors would not have moved all of our furniture off the floor and back onto it.

At one point, the Guatemalans trapped me in my office! There was no way to get out of my office without stepping on the floor and I couldn't step on it till the stain dried. So, I was trapped!

We ordered food via Door Dash one time but we couldn't open the front door! So, I cracked the window as the delivery person approached and asked them if they wouldn't mind handing the food to me through the window.

And, to make matters even more disruptive, I came down with that stomach bug which knocked me out big time. I was sooooooo sick!

But, all things considered, it was probably a good time to be sick in bed because the house was totally disfunctional and I couldn't really do much work anyway. So, in a way, the timing was perfect.

Needless to say, it was a major project that was highly disruptive. But, I was pleased that we saved some money. And, we're really, really happy with the way the floor turned out; except that now Kathy is making everyone take off their shoes at the door so they don't mess up her new floor!

Have you ever resurfaced your kitchen floors? If so, did you run into any of the problems that we had? Are you happy with the way the floors turned out?