We stopped by the job site this morning and saw that Sousa's Garage Doors had installed our wooden garage door yesterday.

The contractors from The Wood Floor Company were continuing their work on the hardwood floors. They had started to lay out the wood for the mudroom and pantry, so we had to tell them not to install the wood floors in those rooms -- we already purchased tile for those rooms. Here are some pictures of the work in progress. The first one is the dining room and the second one is the kitchen, as seen from the family room.


Here is a picture of the tile work on the master bathroom floor.

And here is a picture of the stairs leading down to the lower courtyard (taken from the upstairs balcony).

A driver from Standards of Excellence called me this morning asking for someone to sign for the Vent-A-Hood that he was trying to deliver. So I drove over to the job site, and we put the hood in Brad's trailer.

The contractors from The Wood Floor Company were already there starting the hardwood floor installation.

The tile crews were putting the finishing touches on the courtyard steps, grouting the balcony and master bathroom shower, and continuing to work on the master bathroom floor.

Later in the afternoon, we met with Brad and Bruce from CB Showers and went over all the shower glass and mirrors. He said he'll be able to provide us with an estimate in a few days.

This morning we went to Home Depot to place a special order for some more lighting fixtures. Unfortunately the fixtures probably won't arrive until late April.

In the afternoon, we met with Lucia at the job site. She brought with her the last vanity top (for bath #2). Her crew had already installed the vanity tops for bath #1 and bath #3 and the fireplace surround.

Later in the afternoon, they completed bath #2 and the master bath vanity backsplash. Here's a picture of Rudy installing the granite in bath #2.

The painting crew was busy taking out window sashes on the first floor and priming all of them along with the casings and the dining room wainscot.

The dining room pocket doors were installed this morning.

The tile crews were busy working on the courtyard steps, the master bath floor, and the balcony.

Leonard from J B Ornamental Iron installed some more railings around the lower courtyard and anchored them into the column.

Finally, I went back to Home Depot and picked up some ceiling fans for the upstairs bedrooms and surface mounted fluorescent lights for the laundry room, pantry, mudroom, and craftroom closet.

We went to Lowes this morning and purchased a vanity light for guest bathroom and another outdoor flood light. I brought all the exterior lighting fixtures to the house and Ekrem installed them for us.

Ferma was back at the job site today, digging a swale for the discharge from the lightwell sump pumps.

Earlier in the morning, Dana had come by to attach some of the crown molding on the kitchen and craftroom cabinets.

The tile crews were working on the balcony and the master bathroom floor. If you look closely at the second picture, you can see they've installed the Warm Tile Floors warming pads.

Back at home, we ordered some more lighting fixtures from LightingUniverse.com.

This morning I went to Home Depot and purchased four exterior lights with motion detectors for the garage, balcony and courtyard.

I also went to Cornelia's to pick up our CalFaucets.

When I arrived at the job site, Sunnyvale Lumber had just finished delivering the transom window for the space above our front door.

This morning, Russ, the contractor from Coyne Stairs started his work on the stairs.

Ernie met with Brad while I was there, and they went over a number of issues that Brad had.

Ernie's tile crews were working on the lower courtyard steps, cutting 12 x 12 tiles to 6 x 6 for the balcony, tiling the master bath, and fixing the shower pan in bath #2. Here's a picture of them cutting the balcony tiles.

Troy and Rob finished the fireplace mantel and set it on top of the hearth.

I had gone to the job site to install the closet shelves for bed #1 closet. It was relatively simple and only took about an hour.

Back at home, we received the Insinkerator garbage disposals and hot/cold water dispenser from BuyPlumbing. And we ordered the chandelier for the dining room from LightingUniverse.com

And finally, Brad told us our garage door should be installed on Friday.

The painters were back today caulking the second floor and preping it before they start painting.

One of the electricians was also there, continuing to install switches, plugs, and fixtures.

Dana was also at the house installing some crown molding on the cabinets.

The tile crews were working on the courtyard steps, master bathroom shower, guest bathroom shower, and kitchen backsplash. Here's a picture of the steps.

We had them remove two of the accent tiles in the kitchen backsplash to give it a cleaner look. Here's what it looks like now, with those accents removed.

Marblus showed up later in the morning with most of the remaining slabs.

This series of pictures shows them carrying the very large and very heavy whirlpool tub deck up to the second floor and setting it into place.

And here it is, nearly complete.

Later in the afternoon, we took a trip down to Marblus to select a new remnant for the bath #2 vanity. The one we had originally selected, had a fissure in it. While we were there talking to Leo, we all realized that Marblus never templated bath #3, so Leo was going to call Rudy who was still at the house, to make the template.

Phil's painters were there this morning to caulk the shutters and repaint the ones that were painted on the wrong side. This picture shows the house in its (almost) complete form.

Ekrem and his crew of electricians were back at the job site, putting in light fixtures.

One of the tile crews was cutting tiles and shaping them for the lower courtyard steps. Two other crews were working on the master bathroom shower and the guest bathroom shower.

Troy was working on the columns in the back patio.

Brad said Lucia will be installing the remaining granite countertops tomorrow, and that Michele had called to tell him our remaining faucet fixtures had arrived. Brad also told us they took a humidity reading this morning and they detected only 12% humidity, so Paul will start installing the wood floors next Thursday.

This morning we also ordered the last of our kitchen fixtures -- two garbage disposers and a hot/cold water dispenser -- from BuyPlumbing.

Well, today I put in an honest day's work. I helped Rick hang all of the shutters. Here's a picture of the house at the end of the day. Some of the shutters are painted Kelly-Moore Carbon; however, some of them just have primer. It turns out the shutters have a front and a back, but the painters only painted one side -- sometimes they got lucky and painted the front side, but about half of them are painted on the back side. So, they'll have to come back to paint some of them again....

There was lots of other activity at the job site today. Troy put in most of the columns.

The tile crews continued to work on the kitchen backsplash and the master bathroom shower.

And they also started putting down tile in the lower courtyard. There they cut down the 18"x18" tiles to 9"x9" so that it can be sloped properly.

Leonard came to install the railing around one of the light wells.

And finally, our large dining room pocket doors arrived.

The tile crews were busy working on the kitchen, guest bath, and master bath today.

Phil didn't show up because he had another painting job to complete.

Troy is finished with the mantel now, so he and his crew started working on the crown for the cove lighting in the back patio.

Brad said Marblus will be installing the rest of the granite countertops on Friday.

Also Rich, the carpenter from KC Construction will be installing the shutters tomorrow. If I have time, I'll try to help him -- it'll be fun!

Back at home, I ordered some in-ceiling speakers on eBay (and the seller shipped them about 15 minutes later!).

Then later in the afternoon, I stopped by Dana's office to drop off a deposit check for the understair cabinets and the playroom bookcase.

We met with Freddie this morning to go over the tile design in the guest bathroom. They needed to redo some of tiles because the layout wasn't correct.

We also talked about the balcony tiles. They're going to cut them down to 6"x6" so that it can be sloped properly. And we talked about how the pony walls in the master bathroom and the guest bathroom should be tiled.

Victor, the plumber came by briefly to install a missing hose bib in the backyard, which I then used to water some of the plants.

In the afternoon, we went to Lowes and looked at faucets and lights. We purchased the laundry room and craftroom faucets as well as garbage disposal switch and an outdoor flood light.

We drove down to Standards of Excellence this morning and met with Will Schlagel. We ordered all of our kitchen appliances:

• SubZero 695-S refrigerator
• Dacor ER36D dual-fuel range
• Dacor ECS130 single convection oven
• Dacor DMT2420 microwave oven
• Dacor EW30 warming drawer
• Bosch SHX46A05UC dishwasher
• Vent-A-Hood NPH18-242 hood
• U-Line 1175BEV beverage refrigerator

The wood slats for our hardwood floors was delivered today. There are piles in the dining room, family room, and kitchen.

One of the tile crews started working on the kitchen back splash today.

They also finished floating the master bathroom floor in preparation for installing warm floor.

And they continued working on the guest bath shower and power room wainscot.

It looks like Troy has almost finished building the living room fireplace mantel, and West Coast Insulation came by to install the fireplace brick panels and logs set. They also installed a thermostat for the fireplace.

We made a quick visit to CB Shower in Redwood City this morning. Working with one of their designers, Shawna McGuinn, we selected the styles and hardware for the three showers. She said Brad just needs to call them a few days before he's ready, and they'll schedule one of their estimators to come out to the job site to take measurements.

At the job site Phil was painting the window seat roof in the bronze color we had selected.

While we were meeting with Brad, Lucia called from Bedrosians saying she needed us to purchase a third slab of Labrador Antique granite. We had held an extra slab in case we needed it, and she determined that two slabs was not enough.

Keith Willig, a landscape architect referred to us by Gary and Brad, came by later and we met with him. We discussed some of our ideas for the driveway and walkway. He's going to send us a bid for the landscape design.

Ernie happened to drop by the job site, so we talked to him about some of the concerns we had with the granite countertops that had been installed. Brad also asked him to remove the accent tiles in the shower pan in bath #2 because they weren't installed very well.

On the interior, the tile crews were working on the master bath shower,

guest bath shower,

and powder room wainscot.

And Troy started building the wood mantel.