The Sixth House: Mini Progress Update 2

Hello! Thank you for being here and checking in on life at the Sixth House. There is not much to report on the home front. John is still waiting on news of how the company he works for will be staffed once the pending sale of the company is final. This means we are still on hold with the interior renovation. All in good time.

We have made some progress on the front porch! It has passed inspection and is ready for the metal roof and the finishing details. Metal roof first, finishing details second.

This is how it looked one month ago and how it looks today:

John and I have spent a lot of quality time working together on this porch :-) We should have estimates for the installation of the metal roof by the end of the week and then hopefully the actual roof will be on soon after that.

Here are a few more pictures of it today from different angles:

Once the roof is on and the details added, the next step is to paint the portico. I am still trying to decide if it will all be white to match the house or have some elements that match the shutters.

After all steps are completed on the portico we are going to replace the front door with a set of French doors painted to match the shutters and replace the exterior lights. We want to use doors like these and lights like this. Below is a picture of a similar door style (ours will be French doors) and the lights from the galleries on the respective websites:

The only other thing to report on is that we received a final invoice from our landscaper. The invoice came mere days after he stopped by the house and I explained to him how dissatisfied we are with the work he has done.

Here is just a taste of what we are not pleased with:

These bushes have been replaced once already and neither set of the bushes have lived. There are bizarre grassy weeds that grow in this bed too that cannot be weeded out or killed - ironically.

All of the hydrangeas that have been planted in the front and the back are slowly dying by the day. It is definitely not an issue of water because we have an irrigation system that runs regularly. The only thing I can think of is that the soil that was used throughout the project (because there is a lot more dead out there!) is unable to sustain life.

John and I are going to have a meeting with the landscaper to dispute the bill in person. I hope it goes well. John didn't explode the way I expected when I told him about the invoice so perhaps that is a good sign. Yikes.

Hopefully I will have a rosier picture to paint next time!

Have a great day!

Kerry