Here's a photo (from back in June) of our just-delivered woodstove, sitting (askew) in the lovely alcove we'd designed for it. If you haven't been following since the beginning, there was a stove in the house when we bought it, smack in the middle of the main first floor area. We went to great lengths to save it, only to discover that it was a cheap 1990's imitation from Taiwan, which explains why it didn't really warm up the house when we lit it up. We then went to the lovely folks at the Good Time Stove Company and got ourselves an authentic, refurbished Portland Franklin stove from the period that the house was originally built. Much better.

We decided, after much haggling, to cover the alcove walls with brick. The old stove had a white painted brick chimney, which we liked, plus it's a super fireproof material, which is all important. The bricklayers came in, put this metal tracking stuff up and then laid the bricks, after carefully consulting with Josh (the ever particular husband) and Mark (the ever conscientious contractor) as to the exact pattern. They even practiced it on the floor first. Here's the brick mostly in place:

Then the mortar goes in and voila! A lovely bricked in area that is cozy and safe for the woodstove to reside within. Now it's time to unwrap it all and put in the chimney... but oh no wait... they forgot to send along the unit that allows a modern 8 inch stove pipe to attach to the irregular oval shaped opening at the top of our stove. Ooops. So now we're waiting for this lovely guy in Massachusetts to fabricate it for us and send it on down. At that point, we get to finish the chimney and build and brick the ceiling area. Till then, here's the unwrapped stove sitting in it's almost finished home...

Nothing is ever straightforward, is it?