The beginning of May has been a sizzler. Late day clouds have begun to gather large and ominous over our landscape. A few welcomed rain showers have cooled our afternoons and created steamy and sultry evenings. We have been very busy with the planning and building and much has happened since our last blog.
As you can see from the pictures the walls are going up quickly and the traditional Spanish arches on the terraces are being formed as I write. Creating a kitchen island has taken some time. Kim and I spent many hours drawing it out in the dirt on site to get a feeling of proportion. We then took a piece of vellum paper and taped it to our building plan and traced it out to scale. We needed to make sure it could function as a work area with a second sink as well as an eating and hang out area. Our builder can use the scale to help align the plumbing and electrical.
It really is a beautiful thing to watch your vision take shape one block at a time. As many of you know the art of building is not so much what you see but rather what you do not see. For instance, as part of our plan we have a separate utility room that will function as the nervous center of our home. This room will house the main electrical panel, telecommunications, cable and hot water but it will also be the hub for the future solar electric, and security systems. We consulted with both solar and security companies to add the necessary conduit to our utility room so we can plug these in at a later date when finances permit. As far as the PV array it was a simple matter of stubbing a one-inch and a one and a half inch conduit to the outside from the utility room. The two conduits will enable us to pull both high and low voltage wires accordingly as the two cannot be mixed. The security is a bit more complicated but is basically the same deal.
We have an appointment with an interior designer at the tile store, Expo Ceramica, in Liberia this week to discuss the tiles we would like for our floors, terraces, bathrooms and showers. It is a bit premature for this type of finish work but this particular store is offering a 50% discount on clearance tiles while supplies last. So we need to move on it!
Also, a bit premature, we have purchased two beautiful tables that Kim found on in the classifieds of Potrero. The dinning room table seats six comfortably and is one large beautiful piece of Guanacaste wood for the top. The other is a large antique coffee table with lots of character. Our thought is to find great deals on unique pieces when we can rather then waiting and not finding what we want later. Catch as catch can.
Be Well,
John
