Splish Splash

All the tiling is now done, and Damien will be back tomorrow to grout it all. There was one ensuite floor tile left over!





Powder
















Laundry - this has the same floor tiles as will be throughout the rest of the house. It looks good.







Ensuite













Bathroom









The colour of the tiles isn't showing well on my monitor - the bathroom ones seem to have an orangey tinge which they don't have in reality.

FFS!

I feel the need to rant. (Lucky people)

We got a reply from the council regarding the sub division application and stormwater plan. Basically they're happy with it, and approval is pending. However, since the stormwater connection to the council pipes is on next door's block - with an easement complete with one of those inspection thingies - we need to get a letter saying it's ok to access the property, if needed, to connect into the pipe.
House next door is owned by Dept Housing. Ring up local office, get nice girl "oh that shouldn't be a problem, I'll find out about the proper letter and get it out to you. Just forward me the council email so I know what exactly they want". Too easy.
Right
Phone call from some guy, presumably Nice Girl's superior officer. Raving about needing more information for council engineers to assess (wtf?);
might restrict their future development plans (er, your property is just a normal house block);
might affect their stormwater run off (into a huge council main??);
compensation mentioned a few times (for walking onto the block???);
two weeks notice to tenants for works on their block. (like you wouldn't let them know, just as a courtesy even)
Blah blah. He's not listening to a word I said - key words being it's a COUNCIL pipe not yours (idiot), ACCESS only (moron), IF NEEDED (d!ckwad). Gives me an address to WRITE to the works engineer ffs!!
We could have approval soon since council don't take long breaks at Christmas but nooooo!!! Stupid government bureaucracy and the idiots who run it.
Yes yes, I know I work for a govt department, but if I got things THAT wrong I'd get my butt kicked by my manager.
Bring on Monday!!
< / rant>

The tiler, Damien, is a machine. He works dawn till dusk and will be here Saturday and possibly Sunday, to get the wet areas finished. Since Thursday lunchtime, he has tiled floors in main bathroom, en suite and laundry; prepared floor and tiled shower recess floor and walls in main bathroom; prepared and tiled floor of shower recess in en suite!!
I'm still not convinced that the benchtop in en suite is ok - it all looks a bit too grey and brown to me. I guess that's what bright towels and plants are for. Wonder if I should pretend I employed a decorator and add a large pot with sticks.

Haven't seen the painter for a few days. Wondering if I should smack Big G for having a heart to heart chat (apparently) with him the other day about life. I could have told them the answer is 42 - or something.

If I can get in before it gets too dark, I'll get some tiled pics on the weekend.

Cupboards and handles

Much excitement today when I got home. I had bathroom and laundry cabinets and cupboard handles! It was getting dark so it was a bit hard to see properly. The only one I'm not overly sure that I like is my ensuite! I don't think I chose a good colour for the top :( I'll look in the morning with the tiles near it and see how I feel. Ah well, too bad if I don't like it - I can't change it now.
The handles are the same on all cabinets; the ones in bathrooms are just a smaller version.

Main bathroom - roman marble top and parchment doors

Powder - roman marble top and parchment doors

En suite - pearl grey top and shannon oak doors


Laundry - roman marble top and shannon oak doors

The laundry was supposed to be shannon oak cabinets with parchment benchtop and top cupboards. Not sure what happened there, but it looks really good, so I'm not about to complain.

Kitchen with handles and back panel installed. Note how it is trained to hold my coffee cup already.

The tiler is due any day now too. And the painter continues with the gloss on doors and architraves.

Stoned

This week it seems like nothing much has been done, but it's just at the slow end of things now, where everything takes time; especially to do it right.

Looking back towards front door

The painter has been doing his thing. The ceilings have all been Builder's Whited and one coat of China Doll on the walls. He has also been painting the architraves and internal doors in gloss China Doll and that takes time to get right without smudges and marks. The house seems so much bigger and brighter now. I hope the walls turn out more or less the colour that they are now; I'm a bit worried that the paint might be too white.

That paint smell is a bit erk though. No wonder paint colours have such weird names, if the makers are sniffing those fumes all day lol.

Most exciting part of the week was getting stoned! The Caesarstone has been installed in the kitchen and it looks mighty fine I think. I was a bit worried about edges since no-one actually asked me how I wanted them, but the stonemasons have bevelled every edge, no sharp corners anywhere :) Cos I'd be the one to bash my hip on sharp corners constantly, klutz I am.

Kitchen from dining room

Love my drawers! I even took a cup down there to make sure it would fit into one of them :)
I have picked up the oven and cooktop; the dishwasher is on backorder. As is the fridge. Once they are all installed, I can decide what colour the glass splashbacks should be - they get measured and installed as the very last thing in the kitchen. I chose handles that would go with all the stainless steel.

Waiting on the Wetseal boys now. They came late yesterday but the paint was wet so they couldn't install it. They said they would be back today, but not seen a whisker yet and it's now lunchtime. No more cabinets can be installed or tiling done, until the Wetseal has been done.

It's very hot today. Hot up in the old house but I'm happy to say that the new one is wonderfully cool and the windows and doors are all shut! Maybe I won't need that aircon after all (maybe). Or the forest of fans - mmmmmmm, no, I'll need those for still days.

I have a kitchen!

Well, almost. The cabinets have been installed so the painter and tiler can do their things. It won't be completed (side panels etc) until then I suppose. Loving the drawers - two normal ones at the top and one big one at the bottom everywhere except under the sink. I've also had him make a bench for the microwave in the pantry with shelving under it. The Caesarstone has been measured and will possibly be installed next week. The laminate colour (Shannon Oak) is darker than I thought, and considering it is shade lighter than the original I chose, possibly the better choice - the other would have been almost black. Overall I'm happy with it and can't wait to see how the stone looks now.

The other cabintry is also there (minus the benchtops) but can't be installed in the bathrooms/laundry yet. The big hold up for now is the waterproofing of the wet areas - Foxy is having trouble getting it booked in with the guys who do that stuff. Everyone is so busy at the moment trying to finish things before the Christmas breakup.

The painter has also done a first coat on all the walls which makes it look brighter. I chose Taubman's China Doll for all walls, doors and architraves. So far it's looking good.

We are also still waiting on stormwater approval for the sub division - but I have the drawn plans from the surveyors, so at least we have an idea of what needs to be done. It's just a waiting game now. Would be nice to get that done asap as every time it rains, I have a moat and all that lovely water is just draining away and not into my tank!



I also have a garage door! This arrived unexpectedly yesterday while I was chatting to Stephen and Paul the Painter (and consequently late for work. my flex is ill).

I'm about to head off to Clive's to organise delivery of the oven, cooktop and dishwasher. More $$$ out of the bank account lol. It's so hot and muggy today, I won't mind not getting served for ages just so I can stay in the air con. Must resist temptation to buy while I'm there !

Tripping the light fantastic

Another quiet week. Biggest problem at the moment is waiting on council to approve the sub division and storm water plan. They can't do the storm water or connect the tank until the green light is given. But work on the inside continues ...

The Dynamic Duo have a couple of days work (the eaves and al's ceiling) to do. All the inside carpentry appears to be done. It's looking more and more like a house now.

According to The Boss, the painter will be back Monday to do his thing - he had to finish a couple of other jobs last week. The tiler is booked in for the end of next week. The bathroom tiles are all in the house but I have to move 100 metres of floor tiles down there as soon as the garage is clear of carpentry stuff - I can feel the pain already!

Major hiccup on Thursday - the cabinet maker couldn't get the Burnished Wood laminex for at least a couple of weeks and the cabinetry needs to be done before the tiler can do his thing .. catch 22 . I had to pick a new colour by Friday morning - after all that agonising over the first one! The new one is Shannon Oak - similar but more grain and lighter. I have no idea what matches what now and will probably have a kaleidescope house.

Speaking of pain ........ I had to buy all the lights and fans so Megan and I went shopping this morning. A cool $3,000 later, I have every light, every bulb and every fan, and a 'small' light-headed feeling as I signed the docket lol.


With the storms making a moat around the house, I feel like Guinevere so I now have a Klight in Shining Armour at the front door er drawbridge lol

We also had to buy the kitchen sink so off to my favourite electrical store we went, and they didn't disappoint. I chose the one I wanted and a voice said "are still looking for that sink?". It was the guy who had sold me the cheap rangehood. He told the girl who had served me that there was still some of the Special Promo ones available - so I got the sink and $230 of attachments (cutting board etc). I am now a VIP customer apparently lol. So Clive Anthonys, people - great service and great prices !! (this was an unpaid advertisement in the interest of retaining my VIP status)

Hopefully I will have more next week and some interesting piccies to show of paint drying :)

After the silence last week, things are moving again. Yay! No photos though. I really like my two panel internal doors.

The Dynamic Duo have done all the architraves, hung all the internal doors and done most of the skirting. I only had their services by default - they were supposed to be doing the trusses on my niece Kylie's house but it was too wet to get the truck onto her block (yes, it's a real H family thing with this builder lol - he is building 4 of our houses at the moment). However they got most of the work done so the cabinetmaker can do his thing. The fibro/gyprock/whatever it is has been delivered for the eaves and Al's ceiling. The delivery truck got bogged and took out the yellow-tipped white post that marks my corner :(

I also had Paul the Painter turn up and start puttying nail holes. He will be spraying the internal walls next week and I have until Wednesday to choose what colour of off-white I want. Who would have believed that WHITE could have so many shades !! The ceiling will be Builder's White - the white you have when you aren't having white. I have no idea on the walls yet but my journey to find a white did produce a good result in other spheres.

Despite having the flu at the moment (aaaaawwwwwwww) I ventured out on Friday to hunt for Whites. And what a charming picture I was; dripping with sweat and red-faced with fever lol. On the way back from the paint shop, I stopped to get more laminex samples from Barrys ( a girl can never have too many samples) and next door was a Clive Anthonys electrical store. Went in to check out rangehoods and ooo! the de Longhi one was $899, down from $1249, as they are end of line. Had a think at home about it, then Zoe and I went to the local CA store to buy one. The salesman told me they had a cancelled builder's order for those rangehoods in their warehouse and I could have one for $699 if I wanted. He had to ask???? So it is now tucked safely up in the dining room walkway for everyone to trip over for the next month or so :) Clive Anthonys are definitely on my list of People I Like during this build - the local store happily put my order for the stove, dishwasher and fridge on hold, until I need it (which will be soon!) and they gave me good prices for all of it.

I met up with the cabinetmaker later that day and now I can't change my mind any more over colours. Just bite my nails and hope it all looks ok. It is sooooooooo hard to match all this stuff up from teensy chips. The bathrooms are the same as I described earlier. I have really only used 4 colours overall:

Main bathroom and powder - Pumice cupboards and Roman Marble (gloss) benchtop
En suite - Burnished Wood cabinet and Pearl Grey benchtop
Laundry - Burnished Wood on the bottom cupboard and Pumice on the benchtop and wall cupboards.
and finally!! the kitchen - Burnished Wood cabinets and Caesarstone Ice Snow benchtops. The CS colour isn't showing well on my monitor; it's a whitish colour with flecks of greys and pale browns.
I will decide on the glass colour after it's installed.


We were woken by the roar of the wind and rain in the storms on Wednesday night at 2am. I haven't seen rain that heavy in a long long time. Next morning, my new house had a moat again - up two bricks high. There are 3 courses to floor level. Phew! It will be better once the storm water is installed properly. But there were no leaks anywhere inside :)

So that is this week's update. Stay tuned for the next episode of The House of Jan - same bat channel, same bat time, same bats :)

I have a door!

The cornices are now finished. And the mighty carpentery duo, John and Frank, are back to do the internal fitout.

I have a front door !! But they locked me out :( cos I also have an internal door from the garage. They have started the architraves and internal door fitting. I know this because they kindly left the sliders unlocked :)

I lost my shoe in the mud walking around to the side of the house too lol

Sounds of silence

Nothing much happened this week.

The brickwork was finished on Monday when the brickies put the window sills in and stacked up the leftovers. There's about two pallets left over.
The cornices still aren't done.
The tiles have all been delivered.
On Friday, they cleared away the rubbish and scraped around the house.

It doesn't look like it will be finished by Christmas now. The electrician finishes up on 10 December for his holidays. There's just not enough time left to get it all done :( and everyone else is pushing for their work to be finished too; the tradies will all be flat out for the next month or so.
I'm a tad disappointed (!!) especially since I have holidays from Christmas eve onwards for a few weeks, and now I can't spend it organising the new place.

As far as I can figure out:

*Cornices
*Internal joinery and front door
*Garage door
*Cabinetry (I haven't even seen the cabinetmaker yet!)
*Painting
*Tiling
*Plumbing fit out
*Electrical fit out
*Shelving in wardrobes and pantry (still trying to decide if I should get the Elfa system for my walk in)
*Eaves and al fresco ceiling
*Connections for gas, electricity, phone, water, sewer and stormwater
*Tank (including the slab for it)
*Concreting Al and the entry (can't do driveway yet because of sub division work so I guess the garage will be a storeroom for the rugrats' furniture)

Somewhere in amongst all that, I have to arrange for the cooktop, oven and dishwasher to be delivered; buy a rangehood; and fit the data/phone points and buy the hub thingo. I'll have no phone and no net without it ! eeekkk!!

I also have the new fridge to organise and apparently my lounges are waiting for me at Hardly Normals. It figures that the one time furniture arrives within a fortnight, it's when it can't go to its new home lol. And I need a new bed desperately and I'm trying to wait until the house is finished to get it. Then I have to stop spending money!

The council came back quicker than expected with the changes they require for the sub division. The driveway for the other back lot (Zoe's) has to be moved, they've put some angles on the easement driveways (we expected that) and they require stormwater proposal by 17th !! Luckily the hydraulics engineer is happy to do it quickly.




Al with walls




Bricks finished.

I like the way the ironstone roof changes all the time - sometimes it's very blue, others it's grey and when I took this photo, with the sun shining on it, very silver.
The bricks have the sandstoney appearance that I was after. So I'm happy with that choice.
In retrospect, I think I probably should have chosen the dark window frames; it looks a bit bland with the beige ones. It would also have been nice to have the front pointy bit to define the entrance, but the cost just wasn't worth it when no one will see it eventually.

The funny thing is the toilet window - no one picked up that it was the wrong size all through the plan drawing and building lol. It doesn't really matter or bother me; after all it's only a toilet window but it just amuses me that with all my anal checking this, changing that, that I missed something that is pretty obvious! ah well such is life. And the rest of the work on the house so far has been great.

Let's hope next week I have something more to show :) I can't really complain though. Some people are building their houses for a year or more - I'm so glad I'm not building with one of the big ones. I'm stressed enough now; I'd be homicidal if I had to wait that long lol

Progression

Progress. At the slow end of things now.

The plasterboard is all up and the plasterer has done his thing with the nail holes and joints. They have different crews/tradies for each section - one group comes in and does the board, then the joint guy (who has the niftiest stilts), and tomorrow (I guess) the cornice guy comes.
The brickies have done all the way around about halfway up the walls. Today they actually got high under the eaves on the bathroom side but were stopped by the rain; more than is showing in this picture which was taken yesterday.
They should be finished, rain permitting, by the end of the week.

I have uploaded pics of the tiles for the bathroom and en suite. They don't show very well unfortunately.

Main bathroom - the dark tile is a mottled grey/brown which flows well from the main tiles. The wall tile is an offwhite with satin finish. It picks up the colours around it. Leaning toward Pumice for the cabinet doors and Roman Marble for the top. This would be continued in the outside vanity.

En suite - the floor tile is a deep chocolattey colour with black lightning through it. The wall tile isn't showing it's true colour (on my monitor anyway). It's grey (with a bluish tendency) with darker grey lightning. Laminex chosen (so far) is Burnished Wood for the doors and Pearl Grey for the top.

The kitchen is the one causing problems! I have to meet with the cabinet maker sometime this week and I still have no idea what colour to do it. On days like today, it's quite dull inside despite the big sliding doors - a sky tube might be in order in the future I think.

I have put a number of possibles for the cabinetry on the floor tile. This tile will be all through the house except for bathrooms and bedrooms.

I'm leaning towards the darker Burnished Wood with a lighter stone top at this stage - the one shown is Caesarstone Ivory. I can also have colour in the glass for the splashback behind the stove.

Any ideas? opinions? Let me know!!! arghhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!

I got plastered

The brickies have been on site for the past few days. To start it was a slow row of bricks around the base. I think they were waiting for the termite protection to be installed (???), which happened late yesterday. They had organised piles of bricks and mortar boards all round the house. Now I have most of one side bricked!

The plasterers turned up today and have put up most of the boards. A few walls, the edge bits and the cornice still to be done. I have rooms !

Classical Gas

The gas lines are now run. The bricks arrived today and are distributed around the house. They're a bit different to what I expected but nothing drastic.

Lucinda, Big G and I did a bit of tidying and re-labelling of the wiring and fixing the batts tonight; string lines have been run to help them stop popping out of the openings.

Cables

I took Friday off to organise cabling, and I don't think I've stopped since - ready for a biiiiiiiig nanna nap.

My trusty gang of subbies - Megan 'Monkey Magic', Dave 'Cable Guy', Lucinda '100 Tape Gal', Andrew 'Itchy the Insulator', and Troy 'Driller'; Zoe was at Indy preventing a t!tty crime spree.
My most grateful thanks to them all - I would still be going if I'd had to do it all myself.

The Soundscreen insulation was a nightmare. I didn't think it would be itchy stuff, HA! and it falls apart so easily. Why can't they put some kind of coating on it? We tried every tape in the universe and it was still slipping. It might, maybe, perhaps end up inside the walls where it's supposed to be, when the plasterers do their thing.




Cabling was erm .. interesting. With my trusty Dymo I had carefully cut and labelled about half the cables before everyone arrived. Dave and Megan scrambled around the roof looping, threading and poking. And we ended up with a jungle of vines in the garage.

By Sunday arvo, some of the labels were falling off so Lucinda had to relabel, then the Dymo ran out of tape.... Hooking it all up might be even more interesting .... Blue cords draped across the walkways was starting to look more attractive. But it's done now.

Plasterers are due next week and the bricks have been ordered.

Blue

That is one big roof I keep thinking. It's looking bluer now.




*Today the windows were all put in and the sliding doors are in place but not fixed properly.

The front - garage on left and my bedroom on right; you can see through window where my bed will be ! (mental note: curtains/blinds/shutters would be handy)

*The phone line has been run from outside wall to where the hub will be (that was an easy job for Telstra!)

*The bathtub is in place - man, it's a teensy bathtub! Not exactly glass of wine, candles and bubbles.

The gas guy is coming tomorrow. Plasterer is next week and the brickie as soon as he get here. Floor tiles also arrive tomorrow as well as the Soundscreen batts I've ordered - to be put between living areas and bedrooms mostly. Another part of my weekend job.

They are aiming for pre Christmas finish - possibly as early as another 6 weeks or so!!

Fire and rain

Fire - electrical rough in has been done.
Rain - plumbing rough in has been done.

I also have a bathtub, windows and half a roof. It is supposed to be a whole roof but the roofing guys - well, let's just say they've been a little tardy but now all is well and the roof is getting up there. The windows are stacked up near the fence so I hope nothing lands on them in the expected windy conditions tonight.

Sadly the camera has run out of oomph so no photos until tomorrow.

The electricians turned up at 5.40am! I did a 'little' revision of the electrics - added about 20 powerpoints, a heap of downlights (fluoros) and surge protection for the whole house. I forgot about fairy lights for the garden apparently. Now I sit and wait for the extras bill - again. Have already upgraded to anticon blanket and different internal doors. I figure that anything that will be hard/expensive to do later, should get done now. Even if I don't get my new lounge suite :( and my old bed isn't really the reason I wake up stiff and sore.

Now I have to draw a wiring diagram for the network, tv and phone cables. I'm so sleepy. And I have to do a SQL test sometime before Sunday night too. eerrrrkkkkkkk

Devil with a blue dress

Things are flying along. On Thursday I had gutters. Today I have blue petticoats! You can really get a sense of the rooms now. I think I've made the other bedrooms too big and the bathroom too small. But hey, I won't be living in that part, will I :)

Cabinetmaker has quoted kitchen, bathroom cabinets and laundry cabinet and come back with a price that surprised me - it was actually less than I'd thought. Now to select colours *sigh*. Bathroom tiles are also on the agenda.

The way things are moving I might be data cabling next weekend. Best go buy that label maker. Oh and a hammer .. and um .. clip thingies .. and um .. those wall brackets .. and um .. conduit, just in case. And price the Hills Whosit. I love high tech geek talk *ruff ruff*

So much to do, so little headspace.

I have a doorstep!

Looking into living from end of front hall.
Kitchen half wall is on the right front of the picture.

Living looking towards media door. Doors to al fresco on left.

And the garage has frames for the door!

Looking back towards front door .

All trussed up

The past two days the carpenters have been putting up the trusses. They are nearly finished and now it's really 3D. I can see how high the ceilings are. 2550 or 8'6" in the old language - bit of a difference to the ten footers I have now. The hall might need a skylight in it - I think it will be dark.

I'm not sure what comes after this part. Fascias? I know it's gonna get an anticon blanket laid over the top, then the roofing.