Let there be light.

Today my daughter and I met with the contractor at their supplier of light fixtures and ceiling fans. I don't know about you, but I don't get too excited about ceiling fans. As long as they are quiet and functional, who cares? Some are quite fancy, though, and some are literally fans. (Photo from Craftmade.)

We picked some plain but attractive ones for the living room and bedrooms. Since upgrading my heating and cooling system to Carrier in 2007, I hardly ever use the ceiling fans, but they are useful at times (like when I am blocking a knitting project). The ones in the bedroom will include light packages.

We picked out a new chandelier (I use that term loosely) for the dining room, but otherwise, did not see much lighting that was suitable for the remaining areas. Everything seemed too fancy. So daughter and I will have to continue shopping at Lowes, Home Depot, Menards, etc.

Then the contractor and the drywall/paint/ceiling guy came over to the house, so the latter could survey the effort, measure rooms, warn me that all that crown molding was going to be expensive, etc. Some of the people that worked on my house in the past use nondescript vans or work out of the trunk of their car. Not this guy - his business is quite a step up from the first paint/ceiling sub-contractors that the overall contractor used in the past.

Which is why I am giving this company a third chance at my house. They did my new room and the laundry/mud room, and while in both cases the process was painful, in the end I was happy with the results. I could have served as my own contractor and lined up all the sub-contractors myself, but I did that once and once is enough.

Next up: the electrician.