So, even when you are laying around feeling sorry for yourself the world keeps going and things keep happening and it doesn't all stop and stand around and pat you on the head and say pobrecita - which I think is really wrong.

Now that I feel good again though, I'm kind of glad.

More ironwork is appearing at the house and it is beautiful. There are 3 of these windows upstairs, I love the way they look.

These are the doors to the half bath and my hard-won bodega. There will be another like them over under the stairs at the right, hiding the pool equipment.

Like most doors here, the glass part opens separate from the iron part if you want to let in air, there will also be screening on the iron part. Every door here has about a half dozen combinations in how it can be opened, with or without glass, screen, small sections separate from the larger ones, etc. I love it!

You know what else? Outside of the round decorative windows, we have no windows! None! Only doors, all of them have window openings in them with glass and with just screen but there are no window sized windows. Now, I don't recommend using the doors at the front of the guest bedroom to walk out, it's a long drop. Still, they are doors and not windows. I wonder what the Feng Shui is on that?

The bog boxes over the inside pond are built, I even understand how they intend it to work and it is very close to what I asked for. Close enough that if it isn't just right, I can fix it.

After a lot of thought, we've decided to have them break out the shelf upstairs that reduces the light coming down the wall over the pond. I wasn't happy with the amount of light and I was worried that the orchids and ferns I want to grow on that wall and in the boxes wouldn't be happy.

The shelf above kept rain out and gave us a place to put plants in the private patio outside our bedroom. I decided I'd rather have to clean up some rain in the hall and have more light.

Plus, when I started thinking about that shelf upstairs I knew it wouldn't work that well with us. It would look dramatic with a few carefully placed plants on it. That's not going to happen with me, I'd see a spot that another plant would fit and pretty soon it would be a chaotic jumble of plants, not at all as I know Henry envisioned it and not what I'd want to see either. Better to remove the temptation and have a cleaner look upstairs and more light down.

I'm starting to reconsider the idea of the timber bamboo in back too. I'm afraid the huge culms will come up under the patio and pop the stones out plus they shed leaves all year and that's a pain in the pond and the pool. I may go with just different types of heliconia and some gingers. We wanted the bamboo to block the view of this hotel in back but the look of it is growing on us and anyway, we live in a city and that's what there is here.

The rock in the outside pond has got a layer of concrete over it now. It was leaking and there were so many fine cracks on the rock that it was decided to just cover it with concrete. They did a good job of staying with the shape and hopefully it has cured the leak. Algae will grow on it anyway as it is underwater so I think it will look fine.