Two Posts In One

Hi to all our friends and Merry Christmas! I have pictures to share from our last two trips to the coast hence the title of this post.

Cliff has been getting a lot done on the inside of the house, mainly the great room. He has installed all the window trim on every one of the seven large windows. It hasn't been painted yet but it did cover up the rough wood framing so it looks great. He also installed the kitchen sink including the plumbing. And the kitchen backsplash. So let's get to some pictures!

This is the west facing wall. Nice wide window sills for the cats to birdwatch!

North facing wall. Nice window seat, don't you think?

Running water in the kitchen!

Here is our backsplash. Lovely glass tiles.

And now we move into the main floor bathroom. This is the travertine tile in the shower. It's not finished yet...next trip!

Last but not least, we had an amazing thing happen. One Saturday afternoon I was napping downstairs in the master bedroom (not amazing, normal) and Cliff was working upstairs when he heard a bird fly into one of the windows (also quite normal unfortunately). He walked outside and saw a hawk lying on the deck under the kitchen window. The hawk wasn't moving and it was cold and raining so Cliff picked it up thinking to keep it warm. The poor thing was stunned. It's head was bobbing and one eye was turned up in its socket. Cliff didn't think it was going to live so he didn't wake me up to see it. He just held onto the poor thing and it started to recover a bit. So he kept it in his hands, keeping it warm. After 10 or 20 minutes it seemed fine but wasn't making a move to get free, just seemed content. It was about this time that I woke up and came upstairs to find Cliff holding a hawk and was able to take the pictures. Just after I took the pictures it moved a little in Cliff's hands so we went out onto the deck. Cliff knelt down and opened his hands. The hawk hesitated for several seconds, we both thought it was not going to be able to fly away, but just then it took off, flew straight away from Cliff and then flew back around over the deck and just a couple of feet from Cliff, and then he was off and soaring. We watched him fly away across the bluff and land (hopefully) in a tree. I told Cliff it was a fly by thanking :-)

When we got home Cliff did some research and found that it was an adolescent sharp-shinned hawk.

Well that's all for now folks. I'll let you know the next time we have some progress to tell about.