Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day everyone.  Today was a bit bittersweet.  Last week we were quite confident that by today, we would have our foundation in place.  Didn't happen.  We're told that our house is 'unusual', more complicated than the Tuscan treasures they are accustomed to out here.  Oh well, hope springs eternal, and with renewed confidence we are expecting many concrete trucks to be queing up Tuesday morning, February 19, 2013.  Today the workers are finishing the reinforcing steel, shoring up the forms, especially on the downhill side, and completing the in-slab utilities like plumbing.

Sandy and I went to town to look at some granite that we had seen months before, but had been unable to secure a slab for our kitchen because the slab we saw was already sold.  It's called "Antique Brown", it's a very rich coffee-chocolate brown, with some somewhat rare (hence hard to find) blue mica which is a brilliant hue when it catches the light just right.  The photo below does not do it justice.  Look for this rock in the coffee bar in the kitchen.  The main counters in the kitchen are all a quartzite material, also from Brazil, called "Supernova".  The photo below is a close up, but the slab has a very bold, diagonal pattern.  The island in the kitchen is sized to use one entire slab of supernova, and the other counters around the island will use a second slab.

We hope that we can arrange for any family members who show up for the pour to be able to put handprints in the slab.

 

Also in today's blog is a photo of a nice little rainbow that happened during a brief shower earlier last week, another reason while we still don't have a slab, but we know that rain is a blessing, right Nats?  Oh, and by the way, if you look a little closer, care to guess where this one came to earth???

                                     
Midnight tonight is also the deadline for everyone to submit their suggestions for the "Name That Place" contest.  And that is really the pot of gold at the end of this rainbow!