Snow is a 4 letter word: Final days of early construction

April 2013

Well, we're on our way home, and the house is as ready as it will be until we get back to our home away from home.

It's been very exciting watching the changes in the front and back yards, and seeing how much progress was made in a relatively short period of time with a good crew.

Where there was once sand...

now there's a clean, finished surface, new clean walls, new step around the pool, a bathroom in the making, and even two flower gardens with plants sewn for the future, (including a lime and orange tree) :-)

Where once there was a chopped up front driveway...

And the guys worked hard both day,

and night, to finish the pour for the driveway. Remember, the concrete is all mixed by hand, there are no machines. Shovels and plastic pails are the tools at hand, with a second skim coat on top for finishing (with a broom for the wavy design)

Now there's a resurfaced driveway and two new planters ready for fall, and nice clean looking walls with lights too!

And while we're not sure we'd say the inside is looking better yet, it is prepped for the three layers of finishing concrete, and the complete refacing when we return to Progreso. The interior has a new zebra striped look after chipping off the old paint to prepare the binding surface for the new concrete coats. All the ceilings and walls have been chipped and prepped.

So, we've come a long way since we took possession of our new house on April 3rd, and we're excited for the next stages of our project. More this Fall!

And you can best see by night how the lights have been added (to both front and back walls) to provide a lovely ambience in our new back and front yards.

And we had fun getting to know our crew. We even held a celebration lunch in our back yard on what was supposed to be the last day of work (okay, so they were a little over time, but not by much, and still in plenty of time to clean up and get organized for our return to Canada!)

Pepe, our 70+ electrician, Eduardo, the amazing concrete guy,and Candelario, working hard sore toe and all.

From left: Xaviero, electrician; Eliasar - metal fabricator - maker of bodega door you see on left; Jose, head plumber/electrician, and Juan, head albanil. Enjoying the pizza lunch we supplied from Super Pizza, as well as several homemade desserts by yours truly. :-)

And Manuel, a special favourite, a hard working fellow who was, as Vic calls it, the best barometer of the whole group. He used as many English words as he could any time we were there!