...I felt bad, but only for a minute

Yesterday, I got the decking done for my new counters.

"We'll be there before 9:00," they promised. At 9:40 they called to say they'd be there a little before noon. At 12:57 I called to ask where they were. "They'll be there by 1:00"

"Really? There going to be here sometime in the next THREE minutes?" (I really did say that)

"Well, let me call and see."

Which she did, they were out on the island, but on their way.

So, three minutes was not really an accurate estimate then....

So, around 2 or so they did show up, having no idea what their job was, other than they were building decking for new counter tops. We had already demo'd the previous counter so I said, the counter goes here, and allllll the way around. Also, here is were we would like a breakfast bar, she measured from here to here 5 feet. Got it.

Since he "got it" I let him be and went about my day convincing the fours to leave their clothes on, preventing arson, and making sure no one poked out any eyes. Four hours later when I thought to go and really check on things, I found them to be beautifully done, except no breakfast bar. I really wanted a breakfast bar. Not only could I park the littles there while I cooked, when we have people over, we would have more buffet space. But there was no bar.

He was very apologetic, his partner who had come by to help him had gotten him off track and he forgot about the bar, he would come by in the morning to fix it. We contemplated the pros and cons of just leaving it and asking for $$$$ back, but in the end decided I asked for a bar, I was getting a bar.

This morning when I called the owner, she swore under her breath apologized profusely and said she'd take care of it, which she did. The guys were here almost immediately fixing things right. And I am now sitting at said bar typing this. Yay.

When I called her later to thank her for doing the job she promised she apologized profusely and took full responsibility for not explaining to him what he was doing. She had figured I would be there to make sure it had been done right. Well, that would be ok if I wasn't already occupied keeping eyeballs in sockets.

Let me preface this by saying the counters look awesome and they did a great job and for a reasonable price. This is new to us. We have had such luck with "home improvements" in the past. There was the wall that was put up where we don't need a stud finder to hang a picture because the sheetrock bows a bit and the studs are the high points. Then as an added bonus, when he put up the trim he just cut it length, not taking into account angles or such trifle. OR the fact that had my husband not been holding a baby when he informed said "contractor" that his work sucked, he'd have been punched. OR the guy who demo'd the kitchen all those years ago who sent me to the emergency room, which is an entirely other post which had us begging the doctor to follow the recommendations of poison control, turns out we were right. Anyway, last night I was just happy not to have a hump in my counters, thinking that I might not get so lucky two days in a row made it tempting to settle. I'm so glad I didn't.

Why on earth would I even think to settle? This is my home, this is what I wanted. Why would I settle for anything less than the absolute best? It's crazy. I settled the first time I got married, convinced that he was the best I was going to do. Not even close.

So, I just want to encourage everyone to know what they want, ask for it, get it, demand it if you have to.