Excepting the countertops, almost all the final 1000 details are ready.  The appliances and some of the final trim have to wait for granite installation, but the contractor may be a bit bored tomorrow while waiting for the countertops to go in.

Here’s what we’ve got:

Crown moulding

Handles/Pulls

Wine Rack

Full installation of pantry (and pantry light!) and new paint (I accidently used the brighter green of the downstairs bath rather than the richer green I had meant)

New dining room light fixtures and beam braces

Sink

And so many new outlets, both on the island and around the counters!

So close!

The Zen Zone ended this afternoon.

The granite guys showed up today.

The granite guys showed up today without the island granite.

The granite guys showed up today without the island granite and with countertops with incongruous color alignment (same granite type, but two pieces that had to be “seamed” together had noticeably different color variations). 

Zen left and Bitch came out.  Bitch wondered aloud that if Bitch had come out yesterday, if this wouldn’t have happened today.  Bitch wondered why no one had contacted me or our contractor that the island piece wasn’t on the truck today.  Bitch demanded that all pieces be installed by end of Thursday.

Granite Guys agreed.

Zen’s a tiny bit put out that Bitch had to come out.

With all the extra cardboard around, Kyla built Wesley a dragon cave.

Then Wesley chose Kyla to read aloud to.

Sweet siblings!

We are eating our dinners downstairs, conveniently in front of the TV, and we found this show on Netflix.

Penguins: Spy in the Huddle

Penguins – Spy in the Huddle spends nearly a year in the close company of penguins, deploying 50 spycams to capture as never before the true character of these birds.

Those spycams?  They’re robot penguins!! I can’t use enough exclamation points to express the sheer delight we all had watching this show.

And it led to this at bedtime:

(She tried my feet first, but I pointed out it was Daddy Penguin’s job to hold the baby chick on his toes.)

Halloween hasn’t historically made my top 5 holidays, but it’s grown on me.

It’s our 3rd or 4th year dragging our fire pit out to the street and having a neighborhood “bon fire”. 

The  last few years, the kids have been old enough to trick-or-treat in the area without us, and we gladly shoo them off and open the bottles, and start roasting our own dinner.

And we don’t steal any of their candy when the kids do come back (that’s done the next day!).

The counters were supposed to be installed today—the contractor worked really late and early to have everything ready for granite installation.  They got here without the island granite, and the countertops were not the right width to fit into the window.  So the installation was a complete no-go.

Oddly, I had no issues with this—disappointment, of course, since I couldn’t even remember what we ordered. But the number of stupid and innocent mistakes* I’ve made in the last few days  has made me very forgiving.  I even coined a phrase for it-  I was in the Zen Zone.   It hasn’t been a  wasted day, as the contractor got the crown moulding installed and about 1000 details that had to be done. 

And it’s Halloween—we’re roasting hotdogs in the street tonight with anyone else who comes to join us.  Tomorrow, ho!

We celebrated Dad/Grandpa/Gary’s birthday at their house with 5 grandkids and not-so-bad kid (me).  Grandma made lasagna and chocolate cake. 

Perfect!

“We” made silly faces with our food for extra fun.

Janet got to celebrate with us, too!

Not that you can tell by the gorgeous weather, but it’s the very end of October, so it’s time to get our jack-o-lanterns-to-be.

I was brunching with girlfriends, so I met up with Dwayne and the kids at Carleton Farm—great place to go.

The obligatory hay ride….

The kids spent so much time in the corn pit (bushels cubed of kernels to roll in) that they almost forgot to get pumpkins.

Almost, but not quite!

You know this is Piper, right?  Just a little something she found and played with on the way home from school today.