AFRAME: Ok, it’s been a while since our last post; we have been pushing towards the finish line and finally have our final home inspection scheduled for Tuesday! So many delays, mainly electrical, which pushed out our power by 3 weeks (6 total) due to a clerical error that didn’t register our early payment. BUT we have lights, AC and functional plumbing!!! Feels so amazing now that temps are rising and it’s perfect timing because we still have 1 month to move out of our rental house. See below for lights on in the house!
Since then, we’ve been trying to tackle the rails on our deck and loft which must be in place before final for safety reasons. We are wrapping this up over the weekend but the loft is done and deck is mostly done!
We plan to let the treated would dry in place for a while before staining it the color of the deck, which incidentally has become so dirty we’d like to get it nice and clean and stain it again once construction is over.
We’re grilling every night because our range is not functional yet, need to hook up the propane, I even boiled water on the grill for pasta in my 12" cast iron pan with about an inch of water and it worked like a charm. Food styling has truly prepared me for creative work-arounds to things like no water in the kitchen yet, must wash all produce in small bathroom sink, meatloaf on the grill? (a resounding YES), how do I grate cheese without my cheese grater, can I fry schnitzel on a grill and so on. I can do all these things now! It is quite stressful at times and I ask myself why I’m trying so hard to put normal dinners on the table as if I had a fully functional kitchen but we are (read: I am) simply sick of eating out and am forcing myself to cook as I would with a few necessary modifications.
We are having our countertop template done today so hopefully in 1–2 weeks we will have counters!! I hunted around for a nice marble looking countertop like our last counters which were a honed Quartzite called “shadow storm”. However in my search one of the stone procurers said that the Shadowstorm they’re getting now is not the same as it used to be, and I could immediately tell because none of them were quite what I remembered and I loved what we had in our old house. Our budget of max $65/sq ft was tough since everything that jumped out at me was over $90, ughhhh. But I stopped at no less than 5 stone yards (lots to choose from in Acworth/Kennesaw), and shockingly found a beautiful slab in our price! Somehow we’re getting Carrera Marble for $63/sq foot from a place called MC Granite Countertops. I am sacrificing the matte/honed look that I love for a traditional shiny finish because honing is $7/sq ft extra. Oh well, it’s marble! They’ve been great to work with so far and cannot wait to see the final result. For the inspection we are just putting in a temporary plywood which is acceptable as long as we paint it. Below a peek at our layout so far.
Our shower tiles were finally delivered, also a 1 month delay due to backorders that were not disclosed up front. A working tub is enough for the occupancy permit but we hope to tackle the shower soon!
We have no baseboards yet and no wrap for the beams which I know will make such a statement and a difference we just have not found a good solution for the beams yet.
VINEYARD:
We’ve been battling Japanese beetles in the vineyard for about a month. Crazy how fast they can procreate and decimate vine leaves! We’ve been so lucky that it’s only a leaf here and there and not whole vines. They gnaw at the leaves and leave them looking lacey. Spraying the vines knocks them back well but only until the next heavy rain so this has been almost a weekly task and it’s taking both of us 3 hours to spray the whole vineyard. We’ve also encountered some black rot, which sounds super scary but it’s a small brown dot on a leaf here and there that if left unchecked can spread each and every rain. Luckily spraying is keeping that at bay as well.
Dawn above and evening below strolls through the vines with ice cream and a glass of wine 🍷.
Cheers to the long weekend!
