One can imagine my frustration when I was planning to be back home by the first of February. As with so many projects, things have slipped. The contractor is still waiting for some supplies to be delivered. As of last night, Shea and I were able to see that the hot tub and gazebo are in their “final” location and fully wired. I am pleased with the location, but I know the final electrical inspection is pending.

It looks like we’ll have a fabulous kitchen countertop at no extra cost. We kept going back and forth on different veining with the quartz. Some of those were much more expensive brands that would have forced me to pay out of pocket again. I was most concerned about the countertop not being speckled as it was before. I loved my smooth quartz countertops before the fire, which I had since I bought the house in 2020. I was advised that the kitchen had been remodeled right before I bought. However, the speckling would always make me question if I was actually done cleaning, as every speck looked like a crumb to me. Shea agrees that the veining here, with both some greens and golds, will go well with the cabinets, samplings of which are set next to the countertop in these photos below. The contractor tells me that these pictures don’t even do it justice, so it’s a win-win.

The front door is pretty much done, although I’ll be adding a smart doorbell. To my surprise, they painted the door itself the same “koi pond green” as the rest of the house, which looks great, even though I’m probably going to accent it with a maroon storm door. That storm door will be mostly glass when the screen is not pulled down halfway, so the green will still be visible, and there’ll be lots of natural light, which is so important to me after having lived in some NYC apartments in my life that lacked natural light. We are now able to see progress inside the house, including closet doors in the foyer closet. The contractor was also able to make a last-minute update to the kitchen peninsula that I requested.