Counters In!

True to their word, two skilled craftsmen showed up at 12.15 and began the long-awaited installation of our countertops! It was quite the little operation they set up with saw horses and saws in the garage while prepping the surface for the installation of the quartz. I was pretty excited as I've never seen this done before and it meant the last final BIG step in our renovation. The guys were great and answered all of our questions as if we were the only ones who had ever asked them! It was very loud with lots of drilling, cutting, shaving, and polishing of wood and quartz.
We picked out the counters so long ago that I was totally relieved when I still really loved what we had chosen. It was pretty thrilling to see them on the truck bed. But the first step was ensuring that the cabinets were level and the preparation of the plywood. Little by little the counters started going in. When the island was finished, it looked huge but beautiful! And that longed for kitchen sink looked huge sitting on the counter and is perfectly functional deep set in the counter. I'm excited about having an under mount single bowl stainless steel sink! Tanner, of course, wanted to be right in the middle of everything that was going on.
The faucet and plumbing can't be hooked up for 24 hours after the installation in order to allow the counter to fully settle and the epoxy to dry. The plumber is scheduled for tomorrow morning and the dishwasher hook up will take place on Friday! I cannot wait to have water in the kitchen again!
The finished counters look amazing and I could not be happier with the entire look for the near finished kitchen. The counter stools looks great and all in all, it's a perfect construction for our open concept house.
While the guys worked away in the kitchen, Doug was busy assembling the closet fixtures. He did an amazing job and I absolutely love the new closet space. There is plenty of room for both of us in there and we are now nearly ready for the rest of our stuff to arrive from Sweden. 
Today backsplash is being mounted, painting is continuing, Doug is assembling book cases, and towel bars. I went to water aerobics and am cheering everyone on! Actually I'm going to start putting things in the closet and do some cleaning. The dust factor is pretty high once again.
Here are a couple of views of the countertopped kitchen. Looks awesome, right?!I love the dark top with the light cabinets.

On top of everything happening around me that is exciting and fun, I'm acutely aware that it was a year ago that I flew back to the US to assist my father as he recovered from surgery. If you look at my blog post from one year ago, I remember feeling so confident that he would get better but just needed some help. Ten days later he died and it was one of the roughest periods of my entire life. Now a year out I still miss him terribly and often can't really believe that he's gone. The anniversary of his passing will be April 4th, the day before Easter Sunday this year. We are hoping that we'll be able to spread his ashes on that day.

He would've loved everything we are doing in the house and would've been up every day, thrilled with every step of progress. But we are grateful to him and my mom for the gifts, both tangible and emotional, that they have given us. The sale of their house has allowed us to pay for the renovation in ours. Even so, I'd happily live in an un-renovated space if they were alive to enjoy it with us. I miss you mom and dad. Your presence and spirits hover around us in our beautiful new home.