New Gates

While we are in Montreal resting up, work continues at a good clip at the house to get all the final details done. And the gates are starting to arrive. We had gates (designed by our architect, John Stearman) fabricated by the same company that made our railings out of aluminum (lighter and cheaper than wrought iron and a lot easier to take care of over time). I haven't seen them in person, but John sent me these pictures...I am so excited.

STained Glass

We commissioned a fabulously talented stained glass artist, Geri Willingham, to do a series of windows and glass screens for our home. A number of them have been installed and "official" photos will come later (when I get the 'good" camera equipment up). But here are a few photos of "installation day" for the roseate spoonbill, osprey, and turtle windows...you can get a glimpse of her genius:

Almost IN

We've been so swamped with house, with moving, with being without consistent internet that this blog has suffered. I have all sorts of pictures and news as we are almost completed with the house. Our belongings are in and when we return from Montreal we and animals will be in the house to. So in no particular order here (and in subsequent posts) are pics and info:

When we went to Bali we bought a container load of outdoor furniture, statuary, a hand carved bed, and a myriad of other treasures. It finally arrived (via Miami) the beginning of February and then it was up to us to get everything off the big container. 6 guys, two hours and one fork lift later we had everything on the sidewalk and driveway. 5 hours later we had things in the garden,house, garage, and nooks and crannies. Whew. (I know our neighbors are confirmed we're nuts)

After almost 2 years of limited use due to drought restrictions and 1 year of non-use due to construction the well we use for irrigating the landscape went dry. Sigh. So we had to have a new well drilled. A sentence I never thought I'd write. But dig a well we did...or rather these two suntanned burly types. 120 feet done to clear water. So we have water to keep all that new landscaping going.

Stairs: New and Old. In the top picture, Eric is redoing the old 1925 stairs replacing the old worn treads and adding "pickets" and rail where we opened up the wall into the living room. In the bottom pic is the new mahogany stair that was built offsite and moved into place. This connects from dining room to upstairs lounge. Photos of the completed stair will follow. this is a photo from December.