Looks Like A Different Block Now

At almost a month since our last post, both a lot and not much have happened at the same time.

The brickwork has been completed around the bottom floor, the front wall has been water-proofed, the water tanks have arrived, the floor joists and floor have been installed, and just yesterday, a whole bunch of fill was delivered to level up the front of the block.

The top storey frames and the roof trusses should have already been on by now, but between a heap of rain, and getting stuffed around on fill, they are not.

The frames will hopefully be up by Christmas, and the garage slab should be being poured today (we will see about that when I get home).

It should be quite an exciting start to the year for us as the builder has promised that his people will be getting stuck in to make up for lost time...very frustrating!!!

If I don't post in the next week, we hope that you all have a great Christmas and a safe new year.

Bellsy The Brickie

In these tough economic times, we need to save as much money where we can. This is our new brickie...and she works cheap!!!

Our last update showed the bricks arriving, and starting to be laid. They have now laid about 85% of the bottom floor of our house, and the bottom right hand corner of the photo below is where they will now start to form up to lay a floating concrete slab for the garage.

Over the next couple of days the block wall at the front will be filled with concrete, in readiness for the whole front yard to be filled with soil, to bring the level up to the garage and front door.

The brickies will then be back to finish the last little peice of the bottom floor, the floor frame will go on, then we can do it all again for the upper floor!

Below where the front door will be (about where the red conveyor belt is in the photo below), they have had to put some extra brickwork in to hold up the garage floor. This has created a little room with a small door on it (up to my shoulders). Even before I could claim it for a cellar or something similar, the kids had claimed it as a disco room. So now, when no one is working on the house, they go in and dance & sing....should I tell them that it will become the "naughty room"???

I have also reloaded the frame photo in the 15 October post below, it should now expand when you click it so that you can actually see the labels I put on the rooms.

Ben the Foreman

This is Ben in his foreman's chair, he drags it over and plonks himself in it every chance he can get to supervise the builders.

The bricks arrived the other day. 4,000 bricks were sitting in pallets up and down the street, the next day the crane arrived and lifted them down the hill. I think Isabella and Ben screamed from excitement, when they saw the big crane. The novelty wore off pretty quickly for Bellsy, but Ben sat in his supervisor's chair for about 90 minutes and didn't really move...boys and toys!!!

We were lying in bed at about 6.30a yesterday and there was all noise and action coming from the block. The brickies arrived. These guys don't mess around, they were straight into it and worked most of the day.

They had to stop when they reached door & window height, as we are still waiting for replacement sliding doors for the back bedrooms. An error which I think has cost us about 3 weeks.

At least we have action again and hopefully in the next few days the brickwork will be up to the first floor and we will have half a house (and half a mortgage!)

Bottom Floor Frame

After two weeks of absolutely nothing (and I mean nothing) happening, yesterday the bottom floor frame went up. I left for work at 7am, and there was no frame even delivered, and by the time I got home in the evening, the frame was standing and fully completed.

It isn't without drama though. There is a great big post down the middle of the back door (see photo below). This is going to take a stacked door and so should be completely open. Builder's will need to fix this one. Also we have high ceilings (which is great), but the wardrobe openings are only standard height, meaning a lot of wasted space.

A few days ago, I got a call from the builder saying that they couldn't hang the front door on the standard aluminium frame, because it weighed 85kgs!!! This is the same weight as me....well most of me! They need to bring in steel to support the door. I hope nobody gets their fingers caught in the door as it closes.

It's all very exciting for us as the kids can now stand in their room (and pretend to sit on the toilet!!!).

Brickies next....

Nothing Like A Fresh Slab

As you can see in the photo above, where there once was trees, snakes, and spiders, there is now a fresh concrete slab. This slab forms the bottom floor of the house, and the top floor will come off it and forward to the line of metal stakes with yellow caps, that you can see at the bottom of the photo.

You might also notice the smoke and haze in the photo...one of our frequent and friendly bushfires was burning close by. I think this summer might be another year of fires.

This shot looks back up the block, and the height of the concrete wall that you can see is about 5 feet tall, or up to my shoulders. Somehow we have to make this area a backyard!

I don't think we will see any action for a week or so now, as the conrete cures. Next up will be the framework, and then the brickwork.

Footings Are Poured

Construction is starting to really move along now, and the concrete footings for the brickwork is now poured. It is currently "curing" (as we in the game call it), and I would imagine our friendly concreters will be back next week to set up and pour the main slab.

We had our first little issue, when the builder called to say that the surveyors had stuffed up their measurements, and placed the bottom pegs about 500mm too far down the block. As the peiring concrete had already been poured it would be a massive job to dig it all up and start again. So we are leaving it...our house is now 500mm "forward"...meaning we lose backyard and have to buy more concrete and fill for the driveway (at the surveyors expense). I will be happy if that is the only thing that goes wrong.

Ben has been excited every day...he gets to watch the "men" and the "trucks", he gets to call them "maaate", and to top it all off, they have a dog called Tilly. Tilly isn't particularly friendly, and would probably take a chunk out of Ben if given the chance, but he doesn't seem to care (as long as we are there with him). He especially loves when the men go home and he can go out on the block and throw rocks and dig in the dirt.

The photo above is a shot from the top of the block, where you can see the concrete footings running around the outside of the house. The big bit in the middle is where the front door will be (but up at street level), and to the right will be the garage.

This shot is of the retaining wall at the rear of the house (looking back up the hill). What you can see is the formwork and the wall is poured behind it. They will remove the formwork, leaving the concrete wall, and then brick in front of it. It is quite a bit higher than we had imagined, which means we will have to rethink what we do at the back door (deck v fill).

The back yard is a mess and I look forward to all of you coming over for a house warming BBQ in February...with a shovel.

The Big Toys Have Arrived

It is hard to believe that after more than 5 years of trying to work out what to do with ourselves (renovate, move, or build), construction has finally commenced on our house.

In the 2 months since my last blog we have:

• Amended and finalised the layout for the house,
• Reviewed our landscaping options,
• Signed contracts with the builder,
• Sorted out finance with the banks,
• Waited and waited for it all to come together and commence.

The bank was a real pain to deal with, and considering we were existing customers, it should have been a whole lot easier than it was. They seemed to change their mind every couple of days about what we need to do to satisfy all of their requirements.

In more recent times the surveyors have been to peg out the boundaries of the property, and we got a pleasant surprise as to the actual size...quite a bit wider than we had thought it to be.

Just last Friday, the excavators turned up and spend a day and a half pulling the tree stumps and levelling some of the block for the slab. Poor Ben was looking forward to the trucks coming, and we left for the weekend just as they arrived....so he missed it all! From what I can work out, they will still need to come back and do some final touches before retaining walls are laid and the slab is poured.

The attached pictures show the block from a couple of different angles, including the massive drop we now have from what will eventually become our back door (just increased the landscaping budget!!!).

Updates will be more frequent now I have something to tell you.

Tree Hugger

Our new view.

The tree loppers have been and gone, and the block looks completely different. It actually looks like something you might be able to build on. The shot above is taken from the top of the block, from Gabagong Road, the street we live on now. It will be the view we get from the top floor.

For those that remember the overgrown mess that once was, you can see on the right that it is a very different story now. We even have the added bonus of getting lots more sun into our lounge room. It is actually quite nice in there of a morning.

The next step is for us to finalise finance, then sign the contracts. This should all happen over the next week. Following that, construction can start.

After a long drawn out process, it is nice to finally have some action.

Isabella, the tree hugger

Timber!!!!!

We all came home last night to a half cleared block. The rest is being done today, but what a difference even a few trees made.

It is quite amazing how quickly the tree loppers work. This morning we were deciding which trees to remove at the top of the block, and I decided to push the envelope a little bit with the council and get rid a few extras. I made the decision, walked inside, came out 10 minutes later and they were gone...lucky I didn't change my mind!

As soon as Ben saw the Bobcat on the block last night, he became excited shouting "truck, truck, truck", and sure enough first thing this morning he dragged his chair over to the window and was shouting it again. I imagine Katie's day today will be occupied by taking him outside and showing him the trucks and trees (every 10 minutes!).

Isabella was a little sad when she found out her "bedroom tree" was being chopped down today. She was quickly happy again when she realised it was eventually going to be replaced by an actual bedroom.

We should be able to get a full picture of what our views will be like from upstairs, when we get home this afternoon.

Action.....Finally!

After postponing on Thursday, then Friday, the tree cutters have finally turned up and started to clear the block. Even today was a bit of a worry as they didn't show up until about 11.30am.

No photos today...hopefully I can get some in the morning and post tomorrow.

As my mate Vince suggested, I am hoping that the scene today is reminiscent of an early Midnight Oil music clip "Pictures" with the deafening sound of chainsaws and trees falling everywhere.

Contracts Have Arrived

The purpose of this blog is to keep our family and friends, who are scattered all over the place, in touch with what is happening with construction of our new house. It will also serve as a record for us in the future, and some memories of all the stress we went through!

We will try to keep this updated weekly, or as major events happen.

Contracts arrived today...probably 100 pages long with all the drawings and attachments. I now have the great task of sitting down and reading through them all...anyone want to help?

The next step will be to get our finance approved, and get cracking.

In the meantime, the trees should be coming down this week, which will give us a great idea of what the view will be like from the top floor (which is now hidden by trees). Here are some before shots, and I will post some shots from the same angles when the trees are removed.

We hope you enjoy these updates.