Thanks George. I didn't think that the hydrangea (or much of anything large, for that matter) could survive in such a small hole. But you know what? I was so determined to have that stinking hydrangea there, lol, that I went back out with my pickaxe and pulled out 3 huge rocks (once I start I kinda get obsessed, lol!). Of course my DH, who got up at 3AM this morning to go fishing, wakes up from his nap and strolls outside just after I finish! So, I ended up with a huge hole and had to find soil to fill it in, lol! I did not, however, do any more detangling of the roots. Maybe I should dig it back up and finish the job? The hydrangea was thriving as it was until this summer with the drought and the added sun, so I guess the roots weren't that bad, but I hate to see that happen to a plant. Unfortunately, it seems to happen all too often in my yard. Roots everywhere - except where the rocks are! :) Dee

It's up! DH showered in there last night ("his" bathroom is still down to the studs and beams!)--said it was much roomier inside, even with the further in placement of the bar. That's good since we really couldn't place the bar any further out with the spacing of the tub and toilet. We were trying to cover as much of the bottom edge tub with the curtain as possible, while trying to avoid having the bar look too low in relation to the ceiling. We moved the tension rod up and down a bit in order to determine bar height. I think I'd have preferred the curtain to come down a little lower at the bottom, but compromised, in order to keep the rod itself at a visually appealing or proportionate height. It's all about trade-offs and compromises with this stuff as we have found time and time again. As it is, I think the rod height and the height of the curtain hem off the floor (on ours) are pretty much where one of the how-to sites recommended, so there you go! Thanks for your advice jacobse and John!

What LWO said ... Really, Ms Beagles -- you are already in such a high-end bracket, it's bizarre to hear of these troubles. With all due respect, you are simply paying too much to be this aggravated. Me, I know I'm not paying top dollar: you are. Your GC's job should be to see to it that for all this $$$ you contend with no/minimal aggravation. As surely you must know, that figure you're paying for this tiling job is stratospheric. You know it, they know it. Your GC should know it and while you're never going to hire them again, he might. He's the one the relationship matters with and I'm guessing you pay your GC similarly munificently. While it's tough, I think you should be setting your laser-sites on this GC. Insist he mop this up. Insist he advocate for you: this piddly little couple layers of extra tile should definitely be one of those costs of doing business these guys should suck up. This is their job and your GC should know it even if, somehow, they don't. BTW, while you've conceded it might have been hard for the tilers to somehow know you intended for the tile to go to the ceiling, it's not actually that esoteric an expectation. There's cause for understanding how the misunderstanding could have occurred. Yet there was also several opportunities for them to have figured it out: excessive overage, just plain asking, etc. For example, that's just the first fundamental bottom-line question my tiler asked of our bathroom: are the tiles going to the ceiling? I do think I had the temerity to think, inside, 'of course they are, what are they going to do, stop midway...?' -- but I didn't say anything. I've since come to understand there are a bazillion and one such decisions to be made when tiling and they really aren't all as obvious as that. They seem so to me but there are so many tastes under the sun ... it can't be an easy job tiling under such conditions. I'm sure you and I both aren't the only ones who imagine our expectations are just obvious. BUT... this cuts both ways. Because these presumptions are ubiquitous I am quite certain every single tiler encounters these issues every single day. It is, therefore, an integral part of their job to straighten this stuff all out. It just doesn't work to all innocently say later on: "...I didn't know, she didn't write it all down". He should have asked. But where this should all be being dealt with is at the GC-sub level. The tiler should be whining to the GC "but she didn't say..." and the GC should be shaking his finger at the tiler saying "next time, ask.... deal with it...." or something. While I know this is traumatic and irritating, I think it is utterly commonplace. All that's not commonplace is the tile-guys' presumption that you'll just take care of it all.

My GC made the same comment, Jillius. However, since my pulls are 4" OC, they would look dinky in a 37" wide drawer. And unfortunately, the pulls we selected don't come in any wider widths. If I'd realized this sooner, I would have tried to find other pulls but I didn't so we're sticking with the ones we chose. They're lining up the two handles on my 33" wide drawers with the handle placement on the two 16 1/2" drawers above them. That's going to look nice. I just asked them whether one handle would be better. Their response was "You're right at the edge of one handle vs two. Two handles would look better here." I agree.