Lights & Pipes

I had to go up to Silver Spring for a job interview this morning (long story), so I stopped by the house on my way home to see how things were going. In retrospect, I should have gone home and changed first -- it was way too hot and dusty in the house for me to be running around in dress pants, heels, and a cardigan. I eventually shed the sweater (I had a tank top on underneath) so I could work with the plumber and the electrician without melting into a puddle of sweat. They both seemed to have a lot of questions for me.

The main level bathroom now has a faucet and mirror...
... and a handheld shower.
In the kitchen, we have pendant lights over the island, a ceiling fan, and faucets on both sinks.
The electrician asked me to show him where to move the sconces in the upstairs bathroom. He came up with the clever idea of taping up the foam from the mirror to show where it will go. Unfortunately, it looks like there's a piece of wood right where we want to relocate the sconce to the right of the mirror. I hope he can work around that!
Meanwhile, John was still working on the stairs. He finished installing the iron balusters from the landing up to the second level and put their Italian shoes on. The plumbers kept giving him a hard time (in a good-natured way) about being in everyone's way on the stairs.
Lots of activity in the master bathroom. We now have a Silestone countertop, sinks, and faucets on the vanity.
And we have a Silestone deck around the tub. There was some further debate over the tub filler, but since we had already designed the whole deck around installing it in a certain spot, the plumber said he'd do his best to make it work.
The plumbers expressed some concern about this photo being posted on the Internet, because it depicts "three dudes in a shower." I think it's pretty clear that these three dudes are not actually taking a shower together. They're just installing the handheld shower.See? There it is! This is another decision I had to make on the fly when the plumber asked me where I wanted them to install it. I tried to position the bar so that you can use it as a conventional shower when it's all the way at the top, but still reach it from a lower position if you are sitting on the bench.
After the plumbers and electrician left, John asked me how the medicine cabinets were coming along. I told him I hadn't applied the finish coat yet because they were taking forever to dry after applying the stain. He asked me if I had sanded them first before I stained them -- which I hadn't. He explained that they probably already had a finish coat on them, which acts as a sealer, so the stain is just sitting on top of that rather than soaking into the wood. Ugh. He suggested I go to the hardware store and pick up some supplies to clean them up and start over.

Rather than subjecting myself to another trip to Home Depot, I went to our local Cherrydale Hardware store, which manages to cram a whole lot of stuff into a relatively small space. What a difference! The second I walked in the door someone asked if he could help me and then walked me over to the wood stain aisle while I explained the problem. He consulted with another employee and they also recommended that I sand the cabinets down and stain them again before applying the finish coat. They sold me two sheets of sandpaper, a tack cloth for cleaning off all the dust, and a brush for applying the finish (total: $8.15). I'll have to go back to the house tomorrow -- in more appropriate attire -- and put all this stuff to good use. Let's hope that does the trick!