So much is going on that I obviously cannot find the time to write. I must say, that although I have been warned about how will it all look as the project gets towards the end, I feel a bit overwhelmed at times.

I will recount everything that happened since my last post so you can see if the feeling is justified.

After the roof was finished we had a little party at the site to celebrate.

That was really lovely but there was no time to relax or anything. As finishing the roof meant the crane was removed, work continued on laying the remaining pipework – to connect the house to water and electricity finally.

I didn’t witness digging those final trenches. One week I was there when the work didn’t even start and the next time it was all done and over with – like it didn’t even happen. Slađana sends me pictures of work being done while I’m in Zagreb.

In Zagreb, I was worrying about those concrete floors. And it seems that my worrying gave results. Basically, our “testing platform” – our apartment – now has concrete floors. But, they are not exactly what we were after. It is hard to tell from the pictures, but the texture should have been much smoother and the colour quite a bit darker.

It looked almost acceptable while it was still quite wet, but as it dried out – it just looks like somebody poored cement down – it should have been a bit shiny. My sister is sitting beside me while I write and she, like probably most people, laughs and says “who cares”. I hope there are at least some of you out there who UNDERSTAND.

I was given some half technical, not totally convincing arguments as to why this happened. I should have been more insistent on seeing with my own eyes the floor already done by those people. It seemed like all the experts around me were confident that it is easy to do. I hate thinking about things in hindsight so will stop right now. I of course, should have known better. In any case, we will probably live with this floor as is and tomorrow I am meeting new contractors (for the floor) to be convinced that they can do it better in the other two apartments. It doesn’t harm to mention that it will probably cost a bit more as well. Ha, costs! Anyway, fingers crossed that it will look the way we want it to.

The work started on rendering the walls. I put the picure above up just beacuse it looks a bit surreal – like it was under water or something. This is just a pre-plaster render.

The plasterwork is beautiful – it is white(ish) plaster finished by hand. It has a bit of texture (organic and tactile) and it looks exceptionally good on the existing stone walls (because of the stone texture underneath). Unfortunately, I don’t think you can see that in the pictures, but here is an attempt. You will have to come and see.

The cub hole above is an existing one we found when we removed old render.

Next come the windows. I like how they turned out. The frames are as we wanted – lot slimmer than most of the today’s windows. For various insulation regulations they make the wood much ticker and chunkier. I wanted them to be as elegant as possible – not to impose on the stone and as they are quite small, to have some window to see through as well. The colour is OK. It is the one we chose, but it looks a bit lighter than what we thought it will look now that it is on the actual window as opposed when it was on the swatch. Still, it is a nice colour and looks OK against the stone. Somebody said they look like they are aluminium windows which is not what I hoped for exactly, but I guess I will have to wait for few other comments….

And finally, majority of basic landscaping work is done. Wow! All those mountains of stone and earth are now divided into four terraces. The top one on the picture below is the one that continues from our living room all the way into the woods.

Then the second one, about one meter below the first one is “the middle terrace”. Again, as what happened when they cleared the woodland – I couldn’t imagine what new space that will open. It is huge – and I guess will have to be an orchard.

When in Zagreb, I spend time driving between various hardware stores, getting annoyed that everything I like is too expensive, or even worse, not finding anything I like. I browse second hand furniture websites for hours, then drive around to check the things. Then not like them. Etc, etc. On Friday I may go to nearby town with Vanja’s cousin – he found a on-the-photo-looking-gorgeous old carpenter’s table – would be perfect for the breakfast outside table – at least that’s how I imagine it. In my next post I’ll tell you all about the curtain poles (yes, curtain poles) discussions and adventures I had in the last couple of days.

I found some cool chairs recently – they are in town on our way to Istria – so I now take one with me each time we go – as our car is useless for transporting anything – I guess change of car is next on the list. They need a bit of work – I will publish the results of course. They were produced by a factory in Croatia – Mundus Florijan Bobić – part of the original Thonet group of factories it seems. Page 67 in this book explains it all. Or maybe they are just a rip off. Lovely either way I think.

I am as ever impressed by the amount of stuff that needs to happen in order to get the house build. And I love all the technical bits and pieces.

And, spring is in full swing indeed!

And, yes, yes, the blog is finally on its own, Pruga, website. Needs a bit more work, but I guess nothing pushes one to finish things than making them live for everybody to see.