There were some more boxes inside the house. Really big ones. The kind that kitchen appliances come in! Here is our refrigerator...
... and our new dishwasher and range. The microwave was still sitting in a box in the dining room. I think they were holding off on installing it because they'll need to cut a hole in the wall to vent it to the outside, and today was not a good day to do that because...
...Greg was back to do another inspection and blower door test. He said that he's probably tested about 200 houses, and ours had the tightest envelope he'd ever seen. Wow! Steve W told me that our house also qualified for a LEED Silver certification -- and that we scored Platinum in a few categories. (The certification is based on the lowest level reached in any category.)
Meanwhile, John was still plugging away on the stairs. I think he and Rob spent most of the morning sealing up all the air vents and registers for the blower door test, so he was just getting back to the stairs this afternoon.
I also pulled John away to get some advice on how much I needed to sand the medicine cabinets before re-applying the stain. He was extremely helpful, and entertained me with stories about trying to shop at Home Depot when he first came to the U.S. and barely spoke any English. He said the employees kept telling him, "Sorry, I don't speak Spanish." Despite his assertion that he didn't speak Spanish either (he's Albanian), they insisted on paging a Spanish-speaking clerk, who ended up being able to understand John's fractured English and pantomime much better than the English-only clerks and helped him find exactly what he needed. I told him when I went to the hardware store yesterday I had to describe the item John recommended for cleaning the cabinets, since he didn't know what it was called and I'd never heard of it (it's called a tack cloth). He said they must have thought I was a foreigner, too -- and I explained that they probably just assumed I didn't know because I'm female. I thought it was funny that it hadn't occurred to John.The electrician was back today, and was getting ready to install our fantabulous new peacock lantern, which was just delivered yesterday. I've been coveting this light fixture ever since I saw a photo of it in a catalog about 4 years ago. It's from Old California Lantern Co., as are many of our other new light fixtures.
Here it is installed over the stairs. I should have turned it on, but I haven't gotten used to the light switches actually working yet.
The plumbers were also back today. They had to cut a hole in the wall of our walk-in closet to access the plumbing for the tub filler in the master bathroom.
They did finally manage to wrangle this thing into place. What a relief!
They pulled up all the paper from the floors, so now you can see the cool green slate and river rocks in the master bath.
Here's a close-up of the river rocks on the shower floor. The blue thing is covering the drain.
The drywall guys had also been back to patch up the holes where the electrical wiring had been relocated and the medicine cabinets shifted over.
And they patched up the other bathroom wall, too. I imagine the painters are going to have to come back again sometime as well.
Now you can see all the different types of tile in the main level bathroom. I think it all came together pretty well. Josh thinks this bathroom feels "empty" but I think that's just because we are so used to the tiny, cramped bathroom in our apartment and the extremely narrow one we had in our house. Once they install all the hardware in here it will probably look a little different, too.
I stayed late after everyone else left so I could finish sanding the medicine cabinets and apply a coat of stain. If I have time, I may try to do a second coat of stain tomorrow to get it a little darker. I have a feeling it's going to be another very busy day!
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