Loft update

This post is going to be kind of scattered, because that's the way I feel right now. I haven't given a loft update in a while. That's mainly because most conversations with the architect go something like this:

Architect: Hey, when can you close? Our construction loan is coming due soon.

Us: A week after we get a final price. When will we be getting a final price from you?

A: We're working on it.

I disapprove of this response. We weren't about to try to get approved for a mortgage in that state:

Us: Hey, we want to borrow some money!

Bank: How much?

Us: Well...we're not sure.

Bank: Well...we're not sure we can approve you for that much.

Don't get me wrong; we know about how much it will cost. But how long does it take to write up an estimate, for heaven's sake?? And there's all this "higher math" that's going on...the tile installers messed up and we had to purchase more tile for them. But we're not getting a credit for that because we're tiling places that originally weren't going to be tiled, so instead of paying us back for the tile, they're not going to charge us for labor to put the tiles where they weren't going. The technical term for this is horsetrading. And it makes me nervous; it always feels like we're getting stiffed somehow. I trust our architect, I just don't trust the contractor he's hired, especially when we've been "about to close" for going on seven months now. =)

The big stress is that we're having a party on July 13th. In the new place. (!!) Why would we plan a party in our new place when we don't even have a closing date yet? This party has been "planned' since about November last year, when we found out the release date of the new Harry Potter movie. (I really need to post some pictures from past parties. We go all out...the invitation for Prisoner of Azkaban was a four-page Muggle Mail edition of The Daily Prophet.) We went shopping on Saturday for cheap seating (hel-lo, IKEA!) and ended up buying the most beautiful deck furniture ever on Sunday (not from IKEA). Hopefully we can pick it up next weekend...and it doesn't rain the night of the party. I wish I had taken the camera with me so I could show you the furniture (it's all teak and steel)...but since I didn't, here's some inspiration...what we'll see while sitting in the comfiest chairs ever...