Scratch coat almost complete, & the most beautiful wood box in the world.

Photo copyright Aji, 2017; all rights reserved.

Inside of the utility/laundry room, which they finished today. (No, we're not buying a washer and dryer; we already had old ones that were not part of the old house, and they thus couldn't take them, although they would've tried it.) They still have a very small amount of the scratch coat to do, finishing the pantry cupboard and a few sections between vigas. They're time-consuming areas, precisely because they're so small (and thus hard to navigate).

While Clarence and Carlos did this, Tony did this:

Photo copyright Aji, 2017; all rights reserved.

Truly, is that not the most beautiful wood box you've ever seen? What it is, actually, is the space under the stairs. Rather than leave it open, the guys closed it in on the living room side, but left it open on the west side, which is where our old wood stove will go. They asked us about turning it into a wood box for us, given its proximity to the stove, and we loved it. So Tony began finishing it off today, using the same tongue-and-groove that they used in the herringbone ceiling. They use everything up that they can. Our junk wood pile from this project has been accumulating since July, and it's still remarkably small. At the end, we'll remove any stray nails or rivets and turn it into firewood, so that won't go to waste, either.

On Monday, they'll finish up the small amount of scratch coat that remains, and hopefully be able to begin the second (now final) coat on Tuesday. It all depends on whether we can get the pigment ordered and delivered by then. We're going to see about that on Friday.
And in the meantime, I'm stressing and obsessing over all the thousand and one other things yet to be done. I forgot one big item (well, collection of items) yesterday: the interior doors. There are seven total (well, technically nine, but the coat closet and pantry door are oddball sizes that would need to be special-ordered, so instead Tony's going to make those two for us out of the leftover T&G). Three of them are absolutely necessary before our July drop-dead date on finishing stuff, which isn't too bad, but I'm not sure about getting the others before then; there are still a water heater and kitchen appliances and cabinetry and flooring and a septic system to get between now and then. Oh, and exterior plasterwork. There's just no end to it.

So of course we still need consistent shares:

• Wings's PayPal account, for donations to the house fund. [As I said last night, my best estimate on what's been raised so far on this $30K stage is $7,500, leaving a balance yet to raise of $22,500. $7K+ of that is going to have to be reserved for the septic, and labor's eating us alive on the daily, so that's going to mean a lot of juggling.] If that link doesn't work, it's tied to his e-mail address: wingsoftaos [at] newmex [dot] com. Also, that link? It's a direct one now, rather than via the "Donate" button, so it should work better.
• His Web site, for sales (always preferable, and the base upon which the whole project hinges anyway, along with paying our day-to-day living expenses) — and just by the way, he's got some really incredible new works up now.
• Our Amazon wishlist, which contains Lowe's cards that will allow us to purchase some materials more cheaply than here in town, and also allow us to divert the extra funds to labor costs.

Okay, so last night I said I'd probably be posting this at 10:00 at night; it's 9:32 as I type this, so I'm early, dammit. Tomorrow, though? We have appointments all day, and the whole day will be alternately running and waiting, and I doubt I'll have time for anything I don't get done around dawn until very late at night. I'll be back with some sort of update then, though. In the meantime, much love and gratitude to everyone.

All content, including photos and text, are copyright Aji, 2017; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.