Flooring Options

With a few exceptions, my house is full of hardwood floors, and I love them. I like the look of hardwood, and the ease of cleaning them. The kitchen and dining area have laminate flooring, which is okay. The family room has carpeting, which I abhor. I really, no I mean really want to rip up the carpeting in the family room. We all have allergies, and those pesky dust and dog hair allergens are pretty hard to get out of carpeting, despite daily vacuuming. The family room floor is hardwood underneath the carpet. However, there are a couple problems with recklessly ripping out the carpet.

First of all, we don't know the condition of the floors under the carpeting. We're pretty certain that our family room was at one time two bedrooms, so there's probably some kind of break in the hardwood where a wall separating the bedrooms once stood. So we're not sure what we would do with that. And the floors themselves could be badly damaged. There's just no way of knowing without taking out the carpet. Re-finishing hardwood floors is a stinky process that would require leaving home for a few days. 

The other problem is that, as much as I hate our carpet, it does make the family room a little cozier. The kids can lay around on the floor more comfortably than they can on the bare living room floor. It's not so cold in the winter months. We're a little reluctant to give that up.

One solution could be a rug. I have always loved oriental rugs. If we could get a big enough rug, or even two matching or complementary rugs, that would cover a multitude of flaws in the floor. At the same time, it would provide a bit of warmth and comfort that we would otherwise miss from our carpeting. Actually, I wouldn't mind getting a rug for our living room as well. Here's one that I think would go nicely:

What do you prefer: hardwood, carpeting, or something else?