parky has been hard at work using his Christmas trees to decorate our house with electrical wire.  Although these decorations will not be visible in the final product, we will remember the electricians efforts every day when the sun goes down and we switch on a light to illuminate our new house.

Just a hint of the wiring that will go into the downstairs area.  Peter and I will have to do the audio/visual cabling ourselves so this is just a taste of how much wire will be in the walls of the media room.

And in the master bedroom and bathroom -

The main light switch for the study and yoga room.  The servers have their own dedicated room to sit in so the study is less innundated with wire...

On the 15th, I showed the welder cutting off the bolts from the steel piece which supports the back deck.  I learned today that those bolts are not called "the bolts on the steel where the wood can be attached" or "the bolts on the steel that are the attachment points for the wood framing" or any other similar name, but in fact, are called "Nelson Bolts".  The contractor was even kind enough to write it down for me....

Actually, I think it was written on this piece of steel to let the welder know where to put the Nelson bolts, but it serves as a reminder for me too.

The steel which supports the back deck now has new Nelson bolts - the new ones are just a bit longer- and we are ready for the rest of the deck to be framed in tomorrow!!

Another big event that occurred this week was the arrival of the windows!  With the arrival of the windows, we can say we are 50% complete with construction!  This is not only exciting in its own right - we are half way to being finished! - but is also a huge milestone as far as Chase (the mortgage holder) is concerned.   Now we can get our 50% inspection from Chase and can therefore be awarded more of the insurance money that Chase is very generously holding for us in a non-interest bearing escrow account.....Yes, the "generously holding for us" phrase is sarcasm......

So the windows sit in the garage now awaiting the completion of the waterproofing phase.  As soon as the window frames are waterproofed, the windows will be installed!

We also have a new garage door; it will not be the final door, but as I have just let any robbers know that the windows are sitting on the site (I know the contractor is so happy for me to put that information out on this very public website), the contractor has put up a door to protect them.