THE GREEN IS GONE!

Howdy Y'all!

We have finally reached the point where all of the exterior stone has now consumed the green backer-board, and the exterior stone work is complete! Big milestone! The only evidence of 'green' left is in the front where the fountain will go. Jan and I, and the builder, are working on an appropriate design to keep the fountain simple, but noticeable as a front feature. More on that in a later post when we have figured it out.

This has been another week of little things getting accomplished, and we are down to the 'inches' level rather than seeing dramatic changes in the house. The only major stonework items left of consequence are the outdoor BBQ stone, the interior foyer/great room wall, and the partition around the air conditioning and pool equipment. The stone masons can then leave after having been on site since early December. I'll miss them, but my Spanish has improved from basic hand gestures to real sentences!

The front entrance is almost done!

South 40!

A clean patio view.

Waiting for the outdoor BBQ kitchen stonework.

Patio view of the pool area and back pasture.

The monastic patio view.

Side view of the front area.

In addition, we have seen the return of the trim carpenters working to finalize items in the house that required the cabinets to be set first. After the carpenters are finished, the painters will return to finish cabinet work, repaint some walls,  repaint the outside trims after the stonework, and the general touch-up that that will be needed.

Finishing out the cabinet and floor trims.

View from the Great Room (sorry about the rain spots on the lens).

Lighting and chandeliers are delivered!

Our never ending challenge is to collect as much rainwater in the tank as soon as possible. Have you heard the old saying that "He who dies with the most toys, wins"? Well, around here it is "He who dies with the most rainwater, wins"! To that end, we moved ever closer yesterday with the installation of all of the gutters on the house. The next step is getting the downspouts in and connected to the main collection pipe, and then we are home free!

Gutters!!

And, of course, installation work continues on the most important room in the house - the Wine Room! We're finally getting to see the setup, and understanding better how we are going to organize vintages, varietals, wineries, etc. Lots to do, but we do need to get the wine here soon!

Back wall view.

Left wall view.

But Wait, There's More!

We were driving down the street the other day and happened on two of the bulls squaring off on either side of the fence. Of course, when we stopped, the bulls decided that we were more interesting and decided to give us the hard stare.

Getting ready to tango.

We ended up being more interesting.

That's all for now. See ya later!

- Jan and John -