Fighting to the Finish

By now I had hoped to post pictures of our beautiful new bathroom counter top and sink, but for whatever reason, this bathroom is fighting us to the finish.  Or maybe it is fighting not to get finished.

The counter top installers came on Friday.  They had done an excellent job of mounting (gluing) the undermount sink to the countertop, and the holes all were drilled in the right place.  They put the counter top on the vanity, and it fit beautifully.  I took one look at it, and my heart sank.

Next to the sink, I saw three quarter-sized round spots that looked as if someone had dropped oil on the countertop.  Those spots were not there when Rick and I, along with Leanna from the stone counter top company, looked at the slab at their shop.  The colors are perfect.  The veining was pretty; we would have told Leanna to avoid those spots had we seen them in the stone at the time. The counter top was great in the house, but those spots were jarring to the eye.

I asked if they could wipe the spots out.  One of the men tried; then he said that the spots were a natural part of the stone and would not come out.  Rick knew that if we kept the stone, I would forever be trying to wipe those spots away, so we rejected the granite.  We told them to take it out and to take it back to their shop.  They called the shop, and the owner said that they would have one of their men look at the slab this morning. I am heartsick.

We may have to buy a new sink if they cannot release the old one from this slab of granite.  We may have to pay for a new slab of granite since we rejected the old one.  This set-back not only costs us time, it also may cost us up to $1000 more.  I just want to cry.

The new white quartz windowsill fits well and looks great.

The sill will be easy to dust and keep clean.

The only good thing about Friday is that we did get the windowsill installed.  We chose a white quartz stone to match the window and to match the other white tile windowsills in the rest of the house. The installer asked me three times if I was sure that I wanted the windowsill before he would install it.  I finally had to drag him into other rooms to show him that all of the rest of the windowsills in the house were white, too. We are pleased with how the windowsill looks.

So now we wait.  We are without a counter top and sink once again until we can talk to the stone company to see what we can do. We cannot go to the stone company today to pick out a new piece of granite since we are waiting right now for the roofing company to come and to put a new roof onto the house.  They are late, so that is making me a bit nervous, too.

The bougainvillea have reacted well to the plant food.

So on to positive things in a very negative week.  At least nature is starting to cooperate with us.  We finally received rain this week, although probably still not enough to change our dry brown grass to green.  However, with attention and watering, my fertilized bougainvillea have produced some beautiful color just in time for Christmas.

The bougainvillea climb the trellis to fill in the gap in our fence.

When Rick retired from teaching, his teaching friends in the FACE program made him a garden stepping stone with a glass mosaic palm tree.  We have stored it for the past five years because we did not have the right place to put it.  Yesterday I finally sealed the concrete and set it up in the corner garden.  Now at least something is making me smile.

The stepping stone adds a bit of color to the garden.

Palm trees are our theme for this house.

We took a long walk yesterday on the Dunedin causeway.  While the weather was mild with a wonderful breeze, dark clouds threatened (but ultimately never delivered) some rain.  The walk was still peaceful and beautiful, and after this week, that is just what I needed.

The light was fantastic to watch while we walked.

P.S. The roofing company just called.  someone should have called us on Friday -- but didn't.  They will not be here to start our roofing job until tomorrow.