Take My Breath Away

(Does the title give you a good Friday earworm? You're welcome.)

We've been moving stuff one truck-load at a time over the last few weeks, and we were SO EXCITED to go see the progress on the floors last night. 

The good news: our contractors had finished filling and sanding, and had applied at least one coat of the Swedish finish. (what is it, Swedish or Finnish?)

 Fir changes color when exposed to light, so I don't expect these colors to be as vibrant forever, 

but they're still gorgeous.

I'd forgotten we'd asked them to refinish the upstairs hall closet, so that was a nice surprise.

 The bad news: we'd of course done our research on what finish we wanted, but in the excitement, had forgotten there's a reason that Swedish finish (what is it...oh never mind) is banned in at least one state. We'd brought a load of stuff over with the intent to put it in the basement...but you could smell the fumes from outside the house. We braved them long enough to pop in and take pictures, but there was no way we could stay in for more than a minute or so. We ended up putting everything in the garage. According to the internet, the fumes are worst during the first 24 hours, but can linger for up to six weeks after, depending on the ventilation. We've got all the windows open, and will probably hang out (outside, of course) over the weekend with the doors open and fans going, but hopefully it will dissipate quickly enough that we can get moved in soon!