disappearing carpenters

While Doug was waiting for the carpenters to come back to finish the steps, he did a bunch of miscellaneous things, like framing the attic floor and some doorways, more window installation, and installing a patio door into the porch. That is when he fell and CRACKED ONE OF HIS RIBS.

We had such a fantastic experience with the kitchen designer that we decided to get some advice from a lighting designer as well. We have mixed feelings about that experience. We did learn a lot, but it was expensive and more complicated than it needed to be. I wish we had researched it more and figured it all out on our own. But we did get detailed lighting diagrams done for the electrician who was due to start work this month.

I spent a lot of time this month sanding and painting a bunch of doors. These doors all have multiple window panes in them. It was a real pain to paint these doors, but they look really nice. Except that the front door color is not exactly what I had in mind – it’s what Doug had in mind. Maybe I’ll be able to do something about that later, like the next time Doug goes out on tour. The door is very pretty, but maybe just a little too pretty for our particular neighborhood.

Next we had to pick out and buy all of our plumbing stuff so that the plumber could do the proper rough-ins. I hate picking stuff out – it is so hard to decide what will look the best in all of those rooms that don’t even exist yet.

I got awesome deep bathtubs and beautiful medicine cabinets. Oh, and my kitchen sink is named “Orca" - not by me, but by the manufacturer. Doug selected some pretty cool looking faucets and a really girly sink for the powder room. If I can stand what he likes, I let him pick stuff out. I still don’t know about that door color though.

The pretty sink that Doug picked out



This door certainly is purple

STAIR TROUBLES
Around the middle of May, a different set of carpenters showed up to start building the basement stairs. Doug was going to the ITF in Las Vegas, but Cyndy decided to stay home so that she could let the carpenters in - hoping that they would continue working on the steps while Doug was gone. On their last day of work they left early while Doug was out buying additional lumber for them. They didn’t come back - ever. So I stayed home from Vegas for nothing.

About a month later we realized that they had made a significant error with the basement steps and probably just didn’t want to have to deal with fixing it. Their excuse for not coming back was that Doug was tardy in supplying some of the materials they needed. They actually left and never came back while he was at Home Depot buying the additional wood for them.

Fortunately these were just the basement stairs, and there was enough room to work around the error – except that there might not be quite enough height where the stairs pass under the header joist. It’s close, so hopefully the inspectors will let it go, if they even notice. If not we’ll have to get new stairs built, or build them ourselves.