It's Official we're locked up!

Hey all, like the new look?? Since we are now moving into the interior, which will be painted "divinity" eventually, I thought should start with redecorating the blog (LOL)

Well, today the missing weatherboard (at least that's what I think it is) over the garage was installed. It was the final thing we were waiting on to complete the lock up stage. So today off to the bank to get a hefty transfer over to PD's account. Can I just say OUCH!!! I really hope that we get handover before 11 August,the interest bill just got a swift kick!.
The garage in all it's glory..
The fixing started today. My sidelight has been installed, quite a lot of architrave has been cut and left in rooms waiting to be put up. A few windows have already been trimmed. From the inside..

And from the outside. Sorry for the poor photo quality. I had to take these myself. DH was otherwise engaged.

The bath has been installed on a bed of bricks and the stuff that they make the shower bases out of has been used as a bed on top of the bricks.

This is the spa install. You can see they have used about half a pallet of bricks, they go right the way across the spa to the back wall and the entire length of it as well. Again a bed of the shower base stuff ( like my technical talk???)

Downpipes have been installed and the drainage has been moved. Now DH can stop stressing that there is a storm water pipe in the middle of the driveway!

It looks like the next BSS inspection has also happened as there are marks on the walls everywhere. You'd think that a really tall three year old had gone mad with a pencil in there.

I'm not sure whether to be concerned or not. Our SS has seemed to be on the ball with everything so far and has attended to most of our issues so we'll give it a while and see what he says.

Can't wait to see the doors hung!

Stopped Plaster and Cornice

Well, although it does not seem like it, a lot has happened this week. As of today all the plaster has been stopped, sanded and all the cornice is on. We really like the cornice we chose for the living areas, it's Concerto.

The waste pipe was moved in the powder room, so I assume they can come back now and fit that cabinet. Bath has been delivered and installed. Doors and architraves have been delivered. Shower bases formed in ensuite and bathroom. Looks like the spa does not fit in the cradle through, oops.
Now for the pics!

This is the formal lounge room, they have cut out for the fireplace now, if you look closely you can see the cornice.

The bi folds are in and look sensational. This is the view from the kitchen looking towards the alfresco area and dining room.

Bath arrived and was installed in the bathroom...

Deliveries this week, firstly a heap of architrave timber...

Our gorgeous front door, with a side light. We like a fairly classic sort of look, so we chose these from the Corinthian catalogue. We're both also fairly individual so it suits us to have what no one else is having.

And all our internal doors. We LOVE the classic look of these doors, they are 2.5m high as DH is quite tall. Our mirrored sliding robe doors are supposed to be there too. We can see the frames but not sure if the mirrors are there. We'll have to wait until they are installed. You can just see the sidelight peeking out the back.

Now, at K's special request, the spa and ensuite layout. We were a bit concerned about this because PD did not have it on display and did not have one being built at the time.
Firstly, the spa, decina duo...

Looking from the master bedroom into the ensuite..

Then moving into the ensuite looking across the vanity, spa dead ahead, shower in the corner...

Looking towards the shower and spa area...

And finally the shower base..

Hope you enjoyed the tour, K!

On another note, we are getting a bit concerned about our green bricks.
If you click on the picture and look at it, you can see some of our bricks are turning quite a nasty shade of green. We have let PD know about this but it seems to be getting worse.

Have a good one everyone!

It must be love...

Hello All.

Sorry for the long break between posts. Life has been hectic everywhere! We are trying to get our current house on the market. Culling, cleaning, trips to the tip, trips to a storage unit, stuff for charity, toy drives etc.

On the house front, we were supposed to be at lock up last Friday (13th, any one else a bit worried? LOL) As I pointed out to the SS, if I can walk through where the sidelight is supposed to be, it ain't locked up! Anyway they then nailed a bit of board across there as it will not be installed until "fix stage" apparently. Our friendly inspector was out there this Friday and PD still have one thing to do before we hand over the money. I have emailed the CSC to let her know.

However, he did note that the timber bifolds and the french doors in the alfresco are 11mm out of plumb and that the lintel and brickwork need to be taken down and done again. We have passed this on too. Perhaps we won't make that August 11 deadline after all ???

Our eaves (all two of them) are in as well as the portico roof. Almost all of our plastering has now been stopped. The only real thing left is to put up the cornice and, of course, fill all the bits they missed. From what we have been told they come back this week to put the cornice up and the fix carpenter starts mid week this week.

This is the master ensuite with niche. Lovely!!


The ensuite cabinetry. Bottom cupboards are Black Tulip and the bench is stipple burnished plum. Handles are black nickel bows. Quite happy in the end with the basins. Although I love the basins that look like a bowl on the bench, they are not practical for us. DH is very tall and I am vertically challenged. LOL. We have the benches all set to 900, with the bowl on top that would have meant that I needed a step ladder to clean my teeth LOL.



And another picture because I love the way it turned out!


The bathroom. Top is carrera and the bottom is Peacock. This is the battle I lost. Note a small win as I did get the drawers added to the unit. Trade off is that the basin is not centred. We're not worried. With two girls, we NEED storage in the bathroom.

The tiles we got at NT are almost an exact match for this laminex. We are using the tiles on the floor and the walls of the bathroom. they look like a white marbled with grey. Really happy that this turned out so well. The small chips of laminex make it hard to imagine the detail in the larger patterned pieces. We are having green shaded feature tiles.

Front on, the bathroom vanity showing the drawers on the side of the unit.

The kitchen, bottom cupboards are stippled burnished plum, top is antique white. Notice template for my sink. This is the battle I won. The colours look a bit washed out. It was quite overcast. The white stickers give it the designer look...

This is the back wall of the kitchen, with my pot drawers. Hmmm, not as big (wide) as I thought they were...
Kitchen bench from the side. We added an extra set of drawers here. Otherwise it was a "dead corner" cupboard as the other side is up against the sink. The open space is the Walk in Pantry.

You can just see, hiding in the dishwasher space, the powder room cupboard. The waste pipe is in the wrong place for the kicker and has to be moved before the cupboard can be installed.

Mortar Issues. There are a few places like this however this is at the front of the house and it does stand out like dog's / budgies you get the drift... The SS says it is an easy fix, but I am not so sure. Will find out if any of my bricks turn green over the next few days/weeks as the bricks were cleaned last Monday. So the brickie will be back to fix up all the areas where they have blasted the mortar out between the bricks I assume??? Can anyone tell me if this is what happens and if it really is an easy fix???

Hope you guys appreciate all these pics! Blogger is giving me hell uploading pics tonight but I LOVE my cabinetry colours. No offence to anyone out there but there are no neutrals in sight! Just vibrant colour.

I tried to upload the laundry, black with white. What a great colour scheme!!!! but it just keeps cutting out and quite frankly, I am over trying to upload pics.

Have a good one!

Plastered.. I wish!

Hi all,

Bricking was finished last Thursday.

This week has seen some interesting developments. Our plasterers, who were supposed to show up on the 25th February finally found the house and started yesterday (Wednesday). I can say, without fear of contradiction, that these guys are only in it for the money. No pride in their work, no care factor, basically if they gave a continental, they would not be there. Perhaps we have been lucky with the majority of trades on our site, most of them have been pretty good.

We can only hope that when they stop the plaster that they can fix all the dings, dints, holes, crumbled edges etc that we are seeing so far. And that they are alot better at stopping than hanging. Also, we found sound screen on the floor where it had obviously fallen out, as you can see from the pic below

We know because we tried to put it back in the night before. The plasterers had trodden on it and it would not stay in. So much for the "plasterers are required to put it in, it's part of their contract". This is the room and it's been plastered, sound screen still on the floor...

Good news (I think) is that the bi folds have arrived and are sitting in the garage. Perhaps the bricks will get cleaned before they go on, but then again, perhaps not. Also the spa has been delivered and it is the right one!

Below is the lounge room with the larger windows and the spa there in the corner...

So, more plastering to come. Looks like they might have run out of ceiling boards.. This is the dining room with french doors to the alfresco...

On the still waiting front, nothing has happened with the guttering issues, nor with the holes in the roof/tiles. Now when it rains, the water will go down the wall, into the insulation batts and against the plaster that has now been hung. Similarly, the roof truss has not been fixed but the ceiling has been hung. The missing HDMI cable for the family room was not put in before they hung the plaster either. Looks like a call to the main man might be in order.

Sorry guys, feeling a little melancholy over this. Reading some other blogs with issues, I guess I am just waiting to have major issues as well, although secretly hoping that it will all turn out ok. We also have to start getting our current house ready to put on the market, not fun at all!!! Still no sign of a lock up invoice, they need to get the bi folds on, roof fixed and front sidelight secured still. So, no invoice this week. Much better that the bank keep their money for a bit longer.

Have a great week every one!

I love my bricks...

Hi everyone,

Not a lot has actually happened since the last post. Some of our items have been fixed, we now have window locks on all our windows and the right glass in the ensuite window. Plaster is still sitting there, if any one sees my plasters can you please send them over LOL! We did get our internal garage door though. We also went up over the weekend to put in some extra sound screen. What a PITA, glad we got PD to do almost all of it for us.

But the best bit is that today the front facade bricking was finished. The mortar is not dry everywhere, that's why the colours look a little strange. But, how good does this look!!! We are not having render, so this is it and we love it.

This is from across the road,I know it looks weird with the cage and port-a-loo right in front of the house...

Garage has lintel in place and bricking over



This is my favourite picture so far

We are a bit concerned at the bricking over the timber doors/windows. All the aluminium windows have the lintels and bricks right over the top of the window frames. The timber window and timber doors all have an "extra" area above them (about a brick or so in height) then the lintel, then the brickwork. Have a look at the picture below. This is the timber window and the bi folds in the alfresco area.


Same with the french doors (below) and the front and back doors which are also timber.

Can anyone tell me anything about this? Is this normal?

We also had some rain YAY! so we now know that the roof leaks in "bed 2", surprisingly the rest of the house appears to be water tight.
Hopefully, plastering next. "J" told us it was supposed to happen on the 25th, but I think he meant February, otherwise we'll be waiting a while longer.

The bifolds were also supposed to come this week, so once they close up the sidelight, we'll be at lock up. I feel a massive invoice coming on....

Have a good one!