Update: Holes in the spa are looking much better. Service guy came out today and worked on them again. I think the end result when finished will be great. My concern would be will the fix chip off later since it is not the original finish. Steps are so much better. First, because I started buffing them MYSELF today with the buffing pad they left my husband the first day my pool was supposed to be "buffed" as advertised. Anyway, the installer came out today and started "buffing" them more...they needed it. There is a huge difference between a buffed area and a non-buffed area in your pool even if the installer of PT tries to tell you it is smooth enough. The steps are a slightly different color because they were redone. The only thing that I am not sure how to fix is the deep end....the finish there looked amazing the first time. After they drained the pool to redo the steps, and the pool is now filled up and balanced, the deep end looks splotchy. I repeatedly raised concerns about them leaving crappy, non-chemically balanced, stagnant water sitting in the deep end and in the spa in the hot sun for 2 days while they worked to correct the steps. I was told not to worry...well now I am very worried. We were told today to let the pool cure....I don't buy that BS....the deep end looked perfect after the initial fill and through 3 days of meticulously brushing and keeping the chems balanced. They let the spa sit stagnant and partially drained my pool. All kinds of crap was sitting in that nasty water.

A bag of the shells costed about 600 dollars. Our PB told us earlier that he would be including it, but when they showed up this morning, they had no idea about the shells. The supervisor was there and we told them that we wanted it, but of course they did not bring a single bag. So they waited a little while for someone to get a bag to mix in with the pebble sheen. Earlier, we bought a few bags of crushed sea shells for the pool at Joann's Fabric store, but they said it would void the warranty if we put it in ourselves, thus we did not.It is still sparkly, but would have been nice to add more.

I'm in total agreement with you about green! Green = algae = not in my pool! Our plaster guy was really pushing Tahoe Blue, not sure why, although I got a hint from one of the installers that it might be one of the cheaper mixes. Anyhow... After looking at many, many pictures online and talking to people, I found that Tahoe Blue definitely has a bit of green to it. I'm guessing it's named after a lake because natural bodies of water are green-blue because of plants living in them. The ocean only looks pure blue on Sandals Resorts commercials. ;) We were between Midnight Blue and Tropics Blue and ended up using Tropics Blue (Stonescapes mini pebble) and we really like it. I think it's as close to a true medium blue as I've seen in a pool. It's dark enough to capture a little bit of heat but light enough to see the bottom clearly, and it has a really beautiful shimmer when the sun is on it. And we really like how the actual pebbles look where you can see them on the steps and in the spa. It's a really nice mix of colors. Now at some moments it might have a touch of the windex-look you're talking about. Thanks for that, by the way, I was calling it Kool Aid! But overall, it's a really nice, rich, shimmery, medium blue. I suggest that you search online for images of the exact color names you're looking at. Look at many pictures and take in the whole range. Don't just focus on one image you like because there's no guarantee of how exactly it will look in your pool, in your yard, with your sunlight, etc. Good luck!

Thanks for you assistance everyone. I am going with Slate Blue Pebble sheen... now a decking issue... I splurged for tumbled travertine and I am on the fence to enhance/seal, just seal, or just leave it natural? My pool builder subcontractor does the enhance with a bit of sealer in it for $675, which seems a bit pricey at this point (after a $44K pool which started out at $35K!). Any suggestions on whether to seal tumbled travertine or not, to color enhance it, etc and should we tackle this on our own? My husband is extremely talented in building, remodeling, flooring etc, but I don't think he did anything like this... I am willing to pay the money if theres any chance we could do damage to the stone. Thanks!