Brave New Home: Getting it right eventually, sort of

It's been a busy month and yet progress seems incremental, in part because of the slowness of certain things (like tiling) and in part because of some adjustments that have had to happen that set us back a bit. But we are closer than ever now.

First, they did our board and batten siding. But didn't add enough battens to the specifications:

Here's the crew confirming that we wanted the every 6 inches instead of every foot (I truly did not care about this and think it looks fine, but D and everyone whose opinion he sought felt strongly that they should be more tightly spaced).

And so they added some more. But...not all of them were actually straight. And so...now they're fixing them again...Here it is primed and with a first coat of paint (in the same color as the new siding - James Hardie Pearl Gray):

We got all our trim added around the doors and windows:

But absolutely hated the janky way they did the trim to the bedroom door (see how it's not very centered and the left side barely has any trim? it's very noticeable especially at the top/mitred corner) and also noticed the door was almost two inches lower than the doors to the side (the excuse being that it was heavier and needed more framing but that just meant they had to plan better and start it higher to begin with).

And so we demanded the doors be the same height and the trim be more even, so we're back to this:

Unfortunately since it was all framed out, having to take the pocket door out and redo it is a significant effort (and requires a completely new door):

The bathroom has come along nicely and we're very happy with the tiling.

There was a moment of panic when D let the contractors know our paint color (Benjamin Moore 708, White Rain) but accidentally texted it with a typo and asked for 608, Erin Green. They are...pretty different and it would have taken another layer of primer to fix the mistake that would have required turning this:

Into this:

Fortunately, we saw the purchased paint can before they started painting, so it was just an error that cost us a can of paint. Another more permanent error that is our fault, is that despite all our agonizing over what kind of metal finish to use in our bathroom, I somehow managed to order chrome-framed medicine cabinets instead of brushed nickel ones from West Elm. No idea how I managed to put the wrong thing in the cart. And of course we ordered them 6 weeks ago and they just got installed, a couple weeks after the 30-day return policy.

This will probably bother me more than anyone else, but we still might try to "brush" it using some scouring pads to see if we can take some of the shine out.

Despite that oops, I do really love how the bathroom is coming out! Here is a view of the inside of our shower:

In the main room, we've had to work on picking our paint color:

We're trying a new stick-on sample called Samplize, which definitely makes it easier to try out more colors than buying tiny testers. We've pretty seriously decided to go with a shade of mauve and almost had one picked out in Sherwin Williams when our contractor requested we go with Benjamin Moore instead. Shown here are (right to left, top): Aplomb, Mulberry Wine, Sleepy Hollow, and Mauve Mist. Below it is Soulmate by Sherwin Williams. I'll leave you in suspense over which one we picked (and, funny enough, the paint will go everywhere *but* on this wall, which is going to have wallpaper on it).

And then, yesterday, the biggest update of all--our long back-ordered and awaited door panels (and transom windows, above) have arrived! Our addition is now sealed to the elements.