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Hi all,

I have been meaning to write a post for a while but I have been brought low by a case of shingles and just haven’t felt up to it. I am unlucky to get it so young (40ish) but also very lucky that it was so mild – just extremely painful.

The last week has been a time of lots of quick changes and the house is now starting to come together. The update follows:

Hermetix Doors: They have been the bane of the last 2 weeks and we have decided that they are so bad that this post has been named for them. To start with, after originally confirming a price, admitting it was wrong (under-charged) but agreeing to go along with it – they suddenly decided that they were going to raise the price after all – by 1600NIS a door. Or to be more blunt over 18,000NIS (3,000 GBP or $5000). After being screamed at by Tamar our designer and Motti the owner of Sharoni’s that is the middle man for us (another great reason to use a designer) the price per door has only gone up by 325NIS. Motti at Sharoni has been great – as well as fighting for us – he is also taking on (without us requesting) 200NIS per door. Therefore we are paying 125NIS extra per door. We are not happy with this – but we are at a stage in the process where it would take us too much time to do anything else. Once again – do not buy doors from Hermetix – but do buy your tiles/bathroom suites etc from Motti at Sharoni.
Part 2 : The final measurement for the front door was taken by the kablan. Joelle chose the colour and added back the paneling. She agrees that the Hermetix aluminium paneling doesn’t look great – but it is a nicer finish than plain. Israeli external doors are all ugly as they have to be from metal as wood (apparently) does not stand up to the strong Israeli sun and has to be replaced every 2 or 3 years. With the price and hassle we have had with doors it is not feasible! They have promised us that the front door will be installed by the beginning of March when the tenants in the basement are planning to move in. They are also making another sample internal door for us to see before they start work on them.

Kablan: As well as the outside tiling, the Kablan has finished the vast majority of the walls. He just needs to sand them down before he can start painting them.

Mezzuzot: We collected the mezzuzot this week. They have been put away and we just have to find some appropriate cases for them.

Downstairs kitchen: This has been ordered from a kitchen shop. They have measured and will hopefully install it in about a fortnight. We forgot to order a splashback and so Tamar has ordered some tiles for us. We are not sure which ones but we trust her.

Carpentry: We decided on a carpenter (obviously the more expensive one as he does do better work), he has started measuring and will start work shortly on our kitchen and the bathrooms first – as we cannot move in to the house without them being finished. The rest of the work will be done afterwards.

Wardrobes: There were 3 wardrobes that we ordered separately to keep the price slightly lower. We did not get a discount even though I was not aware at the time of the additional delivery and installation charges. These will also be installed soon – before we move in.

Fireplace: We finally got the inserts for the fireplace. They were rusty and we complained. After two complaints from Tamar we finally have them agreeing to repair them (i.e. – repaint). Hopefully this will be enough as they are stored internally.

Electricity: The electricity company has come back to us and said that they cannot give us a 63×3 line as requested, but they will give us a 40×3 line. We are meeting them at the house in the middle of next week to finalise whatever is needed.

Garden: They have replaced the stairs from the pavement on the road up to the house, as well as completing the tiling in the front of our house and outside our bedroom. They have also started the tiling in the outside area next to the lounge.

Railings: The cheque that I gave was not accepted because I was still dating cheques in 2014. We wrote another one! The inside stair railings have been completely removed and the new ones will be ready in about 2 weeks time. In the meantime we have a very long and dangerous drop from the top of the house to the basement! The other work should be completed about 4 weeks later – they may or may not be done by the time we move in.

Large Hammock: The railings guy said he will probably be able to make for us the large hammock between the two play rooms.

Shopping:
Smoker: We have decided to buy ourselves the smoker from JJ Pits in the US after we showed the design to steel worker here and he suggested we would get a better product from someone who made these for a living.

Lights: All of our antique bronze lighting is now ready and is waiting for me to collect it once back in the office (They are based in Tel Aviv not far from Adam’s work)

Natanel’s Bed: We finally found an appropriate bed/desk combo by a company called Geza Ha-Etz. Natanel also approved it and it has been ordered.

Other Beds: Yesterday, we bought our bed, mattress and headboard as well as a Hi-Riser bed for guests (The one that we were planning on using has been usurped by a niece 🙂 ). We are using existing mattresses for the hi-riser and Natanel’s bed. Ya’akov will be using a small children’s bed that was Natanel’s when he was younger that we brought with from England.

Living Room: We have found a curved sofa and an Ottoman. We also found a couple of fancy dining chairs that we will be putting in the corner as extra seating. We have matched up the materials for all of these and ordered some extra material to be able to make a couple of small Ottomans as an integrated part of the sofa.

Dining Room: We will probably use the same material (as it is washable even with bleach!) to recover our existing dining room chairs that we wish to stain to match the American Walnut elsewhere in the house. We have found a few possible tables and we are waiting on prices as they come from the States (imported by the sofa guy).

That is all for now, we will put extra contact details (and remove Hermetix!) next week.

Shabbat Shalom,

Adam & Joelle.