Okay, so I’ve been wanting to redo my home office floor for, like, forever. I finally decided to tackle it, and let me tell you, it was a journey. I went with this batten dancing soft maple wooden flooring, and while the end result is gorgeous, getting there was… interesting.

The Prep Work (Ugh)

First things first, I had to clear out the entire room. This was a bigger pain than I expected. I mean, where do you even put a whole desk setup and all those random cables? My living room looked like a tech graveyard for a week.

Then came the REALLY fun part: removing the old carpet. I thought, “Oh, this’ll be easy, just rip it up!” Nope. It was glued down in spots, and the staples… oh, the staples. I spent hours pulling those things out with pliers. My back was killing me.

Underneath the carpet was this nasty old particle board subfloor. Some parts were okay, others were, uh, questionable. I ended up replacing a few sections with some new plywood. Just to be safe. Leveling is Key!

Getting the Battens Down

The whole “batten” thing was new to me. Basically, these are strips of wood that you nail down first, and then the actual flooring attaches to them. It’s supposed to give the floor some bounce, which is good for dancing (or, in my case, pacing while I think).

I measured and cut the battens to size. I got a pretty cheap miter saw for this, and let’s just say it wasn’t the most accurate thing in the world. There was a lot of… “adjusting” involved. I laid that down with a nail gun, make sure the nails were counter-sunk, so that they were even with the wood.

Then, I nailed them down to the subfloor. I used a nail gun, which was a lifesaver. Doing that by hand would have taken a year. Spacing them evenly was crucial, so I used a little spacer block to make sure they were consistent.

The Actual Flooring!

Finally, the moment of truth! Laying the soft maple flooring. This stuff was beautiful – all light and smooth. Each piece had this tongue-and-groove thing going on, so they clicked together pretty easily. I used the tapping block in order to achieve no gaps.

I started along the longest wall, making sure to leave a little gap for expansion (wood expands and contracts with temperature changes, who knew?). Then, it was just a matter of fitting the pieces together, tapping them gently with a rubber mallet, and nailing them down to the battens.

The cutting around the door frames was tricky. I ended up using a jigsaw for that, and let’s just say my cuts weren’t exactly perfect. Thank goodness for trim, right? It hides all the sins.

Finishing Touches

Once the flooring was down, I filled in any nail holes with wood putty. Then, I sanded the whole thing down lightly, just to make sure it was super smooth. I used a dust mask for this part, because wood dust is not fun to breathe in.

Finally, I applied a few coats of polyurethane finish. This protects the wood and gives it a nice shine. I had to wait for each coat to dry, which was agonizing, because I just wanted to move my furniture back in!

The last thing I did was install some new baseboards. Those instantly hided any imperfections I had from not cutting the flooring perfect along the walls.

The Result

Okay, so it took longer than I thought, and it was definitely more work than I anticipated. But honestly? Seeing my new, springy, soft maple floor is amazing. It looks so much better than the old carpet, and it feels great underfoot. Would I do it again? Maybe. But I’d probably hire someone to help with the staple-pulling next time!