"Aren't Christians a strange lot? They tell what a great place heaven is ... ... but how many have you ever met in any hurry to get there?" In the Fall of 1993 my brother was hospitalized and the doctors and nursing staff told me that he was not expected to live through the night. I was allowed to stay at his bedside in ICU, and I sat there all night, holding his hand and talking to him -- telling him that he couldn't up and die on me then because I wasn't ready to lose my brother. He lived through the night, and was hospitalized for a little over 9 weeks before being discharged. (More than six of those weeks were spent in ICU.) Several times during those weeks he would take a turn for the worse and his doctor would tell me to "get prepared." After one of those episodes, my brother told me that he had a near-death experience... that he saw where his place in Heaven would be. His face just glowed as he attempted to describe the indescribable beauty, joy, and love... And from that moment on he didn't fear death at all. And neither do I. My brother died in the Fall of 1994.

Regarding the size - it looks more huge in the box than it does once it is installed. Once installed, you will wonder how you ever managed before with a smaller sink. On the color - every Silgranit Biscuit I've seen looks like the cream color in the photo that Sandesurf posted. Perhaps as you said your sink's color looks different right now because it's in the box. When it is out of the box, if it still looks that way, return it. Blanco has good customer service - you could call them and explain that your sink came in an odd color.

If this is a current photo, this is NOT peak season. Peak (blooming) would be in late April early May, depending on where you live, which you don't say. And it's impossible to tell whether leaves are green or brown and if tips are dead in this photo. Keep in mind we have had two really bad winters in a row. Many exposed azaleas have defoliated from the extended cold and dessicating winds. Take a pic in May and get back to us.

I take it that the pruning occurred recently relative to the taking of the picture ....? ... in which case there would still be a lot of growth to be forthcoming from the top of the tree. It is normal for crapes to send up some more new growth emanating from the base. Pruning the top encourages growth to come from elsewhere, too, in addition to growth that will return from the top. Usually, this stabilizes over a period of time. If some kind of major damage occurred to the top (... freezing?), that would encourage a whole lot growth to come from elsewhere, mainly the base. I take it that these pictures are (or the pruning was) from some time earlier as it would be very late to be hard pruning crapes. I don't know how picky you are about the structural form of the trunk system. I see that you have the original narrow, multi-trunk tree form (as it comes from the grower), and then cut it at eyeball height for a period, causing trunk branching above that height. Now, you're cutting at the 8' height. The end result gives some knobbiness to the trunks. Personally, I prefer that they create a cleaner vase (V) shape from the ground up, and that the branching is random and natural (as opposed to our being able to clearly tell where cuts were made for a period of time. IMO, all the cutting should occur only at the final top.) If you decide to "clean it up" this can be done any year just prior to new growth. Cut the whole thing to the ground and let it regrow, without any more pruning until the end of summer, when selection of trunks and removal of lower side branches can occur. (It would be too late to do this now.) Here's an example of a rejuvenated crape... (Sorry about background clutter.) (TECO Electric did the original trimming to ground. Free of charge! :-)