Things are moving quickly now, as we get near the end of this project, so we drove down on Feb 14th for another round of decisions and revisions. Arriving late on Thursday we got up at the crack of dawn and headed over to the house for a full day. As always, the weather was great but a fog hung over the marshes giving it a beautiful ghostly appearance (see photo).Our first meetings were with Dennis and Dave the project foremen, to discuss issues such as the size of the painting to go over the fireplace, height of the mantel, the location of the gate on the side of the house, location of the railings and all those things that not many people spend much time over - but we do!
Our tour of the house confirmed that we are in the final stretch. As the photo shows, the painters are in , the railings are going up and the place was buzzing with activity. It was nice to see the wall color in the kitchen (not blue, this is the primer under color) so that we could make some decisions about backsplashes. The fireplace coping is on, but the surround was awaiting our comments. Pool and decking are in, the final touches and interior coating for the pool will be one of the last items.
Next to arrive was the "Wall Candy" lady who is doing the faux painting in the power room. Wait until you see the color David picked! She was followed by the shower door guy to discuss the type of glass we wanted for the shower doors. I bet you didn't know that, in addition to different thicknesses, you can get different types of beveled edges, framed or unframed yada yada. You will just have to wait and see what we eventually chose. The final visitor of the morning was the Landscaper who stopped by to discuss placement of individual pieces and was assured that we had full confidence in his decisions. 
Catherine Lee joined us after a quick lunch and we headed over to the ceramic store to pick out a backlash for the kitchen. Did you know that they make the 1/4 inch glass mosaic tiles worth $7 each! We quickly moved to our preferred solution of a graduated mosaic with different colors (It's hard to describe) and looked at a couple of back-up options in case we didn't like the actual samples, when they arrive. I wonder why it is that whatever option we seem to like the best, is outrageously priced?
Back to the house to meet with the architect to get his views on some proportions in the great room, louvres under the house, gate placements etc.
We were on the road by 4:30 headed for Columbia SC for the night. In Columbia we dined at Garibaldi's, a hoppin' Italian restaurant. We ate at the bar and sipped a some delicious white wine, nibbled on calamari while we waited for the best flounder that Donna has had in years. We got back on the road early Saturday and headed to High Point NC for more furniture shopping! And then home by 9:00 pm - tired and hungry.
