Keeping busy

Lots of progress has been made since the last post. We have also had a rather major set back too. I'll start with the bad. In an effort to prepare for our wedding which we planned to have in our backyard we removed the old concrete pad at the back of the house. It had been there for many many years. It also appeared that it had been done in more then one pour. It was over a foot thick in a few places. It was in very rotten condition and was going to be partially replaced with new stamped concrete in two different levels. I had to pay to have someone break up and remove the pad because of how thick it was. When it was pulled up the sill was revealed. The concrete had been poured right up against the sill without any protection from moisture. As a result the wood became a easy target for carpenter ants to take up residence. They did a fair bit of damage over a very long time. We will likely need to replace the sill piece meal or as a whole. I have called in a specialist and am waiting for him to get by to tell me the scope of the damage. This is delaying any outside landscaping unfortunately. On the upside this forced us to change plans and have the wedding indoors. That in itself was kind of a blessing as yesterday it was rainy and we would have gotten soaked. Also it put pressure on me to get more work done inside the house. As a result the stairs are now %95 done. As is the half wall behind the stove and cabinets in the kitchen. The whole upstairs now has finished floors everywhere. The painting is done through out the house now too. For now I will put up a couple of pics of the stairs. I installed the balusters treads and LEDs. I still need to get a piece of wood turned for the knewl post to raise its height to the hand rails new height. The LEDs are able to be dimmed which is a nice feature. We love the look of the wrought iron and wood mixed together. Without further ado here are the pics.