Sixteen feet done, another 13 feet left to go

Yup, the weather cooperated and I was able to not only finish placing the last umpteen thousand little tile pieces to the long retaining wall, but yesterday was able to go ahead and grout the entire length of the wall (which took hours but who's counting). As I've mentioned before, grout takes all the jaggedness away from the piece. It smooths out the design and makes it feel more integrated. It's a completely different look from the mosaic vine and flowers I did along a short wall and then had stuccoed. I actually like both looks, but given my penchant for making things difficult for myself, mosaic seemed to be the way to go for the longest section, because, why not?

To compare, the short wall with stucco:

The finished 16 foot wall and a detail:

Unfortunately, we're about to enter a cold spell (for tiling that is, not real cold) and work will have to stop for a bit. Anxious as I am to start on the design on the front of the wall, it will have to wait until the very much needed rains are over and the weather reaches that magic temperature range that allows everything to set up properly. It also means that shifting project gears is required and the to do list notebook, that has languished for years waiting for the right time to complete, might actually be cracked open. Or, I can just read a good mystery or ten. Decisions, decisions.