Week 24 Finished Deck & More Touchups

Week Twenty Four 18 - 22 Mar 

 
Day 115 - 119.  More touchups and finishing off this week.  The handles have been fitted to the front door.

The feature colour is bieng painted around the top of the kitchen area and the pantry shelves have been installed above the bench.  At the moment I have just put the shelving in the nook created by the linen cupboard on the other side of the wall.  At the moment the freezer will be in there too but eventually if we get a wide fridge that is fridge and freezer in one I will extend the bench and shelves around the corner which is behind the range hood area.




















The deck is now finished and all grouted.  I like the way they bought the tiles up under the cladding as can be seen in the LH picture below.  My SS told me that is they can ensure the deck is waterproof otherwise water can get in between the deck and cladding and drip through underneath.  The RH image shows the view off the back of the deck and I am really pleased with how unobtusive the framework around the glass is.

Under the stairs where they put the new piece of wall in to block the stairwell off from the garage has been finished and I love the way we have this great usable space under the stairs.

We also told the builder that anything that was usable  we wanted to keep so down here we have a couple of windows a spare door, a heap of skirting board and some shelving.  This stuff will be useful for future repairs and also for when we build in the cavity under the stairs.


The last thing that happened this week was the flooring being delivered.  It is due to be laid next week.

Week 23 Electronics and Touchups

Week Twenty Three 11 - 15 Mar

Day 110-114.  Yay the bit I have been waiting for - that fancy deep bath I bought months ago has finally been installed.  I remember as a kid sitting in my grandfathers deep bath with my cousins and thinking it was wonderful that the water came all the way up to my chin.  Short of building a roman bath I knew I would not get that as an adult but all the houses I have lived in since I was a kid have had baths where your feet poked out the end and if you filled the bath up enough to cover you, you could not move too much or it would overflow.  This bath is deep enough to easily cover an adult in water and long enough that my husband can lie back in it without having to put his tap up on either side of the tap.  The sloped back is also much more comfortable than the more upright ends on most baths - can't wait to try it! 

                                            
Lots  of little finishing jobs this week.  The security system, vacuum system, exterior lights and intercom have all been installed.  I haven't tested them yet but should hopefully get to do that during the final walk through.

One of the lights I supplied for over the kitchen bench was damaged by a contractor but my builder replaced it without blinking an eye and at no charge to me.  I am really impressed as I have been on a home forum and it is amazing what some people go through with their builders trying to deny responsibility on a whole heap of issues.  In some cases it seems to be the consumer just did not get it right before they went to contractor but in other cases people have been told "stories" that just seem so blatantly wrong.

My site manager has been doing his own checks too and there are little pieces of purple sticky tape everywhere identifying things he wants fixed.  He has certainly been very thorough.

At the beginning of the week the tiles on the deck were laid and the railing delivered.  By the end of the week the railing was up too.

Week 22 Fittings and Hookups

Week Twenty Two 4 - 8 Mar

Day 105-109.  Getting close now.  We have a handover date of 19 Apr and this week all the fitting out is making it seem all the more real.  

All the light fittings have been installed and I am really pleased with them.  They are all modern and understated.  I didn't want any fussy ones as the house style doesn't suit them anyway and am glad the ones we did choose have really worked.  Getting close now.  We have a handover date of 19 Apr and this week all the fitting out is making it seem all the more real. 

I was very careful about the height of the pendant lights over the bench and in the entry.  With the males in our house all over 6ft or heading that way I made sure the lights were high enough so they would not bump into them.

      

 Tip - Think about how tall the people in  your family are and ensure pendant lights in rooms are going to be at a height so they won't bump their head and so those over benches will allow them to be able to work comfortably.

The bath is at the house although not in position yet.  Wouldn't it be wonderful to have a bathroom so big that a bath could be positioned like that!!   Anyway it should be in the actual bathroom sometime next week.

The mirrors have been installed in the ensuite.  Its a bit hard to see them between the windows in the photo due to the reflection but it has created the effect I wanted of the large light space across that wall.  The black tape holding them in place will also be removed once the glue is dry.

The bathroom mirror is not in yet but there was a heap of broken mirror outside the house so perhaps they had an accident. 

The powerpoint fittings are all in place and when I was in the house the electricans were part way through installing the light switches.

Unfortunately we could not get the dimmers fitted as they were the wrong sort for the switches the electrician had.  There was also a minor glitch with the two wall lights as the wiring wasn't there but it ended up not being a big issue as the guys just pulled the wires through.

Tip - Make absolutely sure your lighting plan matches your electrical plan, and do a double and triple check at rough in time.  If you have special fittings like wall lights instead of ceiling lights or dimmers ensure the builder has told the electrician. 

 

The bathroom fittings are all in place and the taps work.  Both showers are a great size.  Ours is 900 x 1500mm so plenty of room, and when we get old and decrepit its even big enough to put a chair in there.  The kids shower is 1000 x 1200mm.

                                                                                   The wardrobe fittings and the linen cupboard have their shelves and rails in them.  Once we move in we will get the rest of the fittings for the wardrobes so the kids do not have to have draws in the main part of their bedrooms.  Their robes are all over 2m wide so they have plenty of storage potential.

The deck has been waterproofed ready for tiling and the rangehood has been installed too.

 

Week 20 and 21 Painting

Weeks Twenty 18 - 22 Feb 

and  Twenty One 25 - 29 

Day 100 - 104.  This fortnight the painters were working hard.  They got all the internal prep finished, ceilings painted and started on the walls. 

We have gone with the same colour throughout the whole house.  Its a light forn colour with a couple of feature walls in a slightly darker colour.  All of the rooms except J's bedroom are really light so we should not need to put the lights on during the day like we do at our current house.  

 

Day 100 - 104.  The painters finished the interior painting including all the feature walls.  It looks great and makes the walls look even bigger.  Its going to be fun to decorate.

I have been doing some work to get the retaining walls built ASAP.   While I had the certifier out there I discovered the council rules had changed and it was no longer mandatory to have a tank.  Given the tank was not in the place we really wanted, and the place we did want it was not going to be ready till after we take the house and do the landscaping, we originally had to compromise the location.  Now we have had the builder remove the tank from the plan which works so much better as we can do the work we need in the garden then put in tanks where we want.  The lucky thing is the house is already plumbed for the toilets and washing machine to be able to use the tank water.

The exterior painting is also finished.  The cladding has been painted the same colour as the gutters and we have gone for a colour that is slightly lighter than the roof.

Week 19 Rendering, Cornice and Stairs

Week Nineteen 11 - 15 Feb 

Day 90 - 94.  The open area between the stairs and the garage has been patched up with the underneath of the stairs being left open as I wanted.  

In this open area under the stairs the vaccum system will go under the high part of the stairs and the low part will be used for storage.
 

 

The last of the cornice work has been completed around the top of the tiled areas and around the porch and deck areas outside.

The porch was an interesting one to solve.  On the front edge of the porch where the ceiling meets the eaves there was a piece of board hanging down that was deep enough for the cornice to be secured to.  The plaster said the piece of board was too flimsy to secure the cornice to and it could not be secured through the ceiling as there was a metal support under that area of the roof.  Anyway he wanted to finish the join between the walls and the ceiling with square quad but I checked with the site superviser and they were able to finish three sides with cornice and then square set the fourth side.

All of the exterior rendering is now complete around the front of the house.  I think it looks great and it will allow us to change the house colour as fashion changes - assuming of course we bother with fashion.

Week 18 Tiles, Finishes and Rendering

Week Eighteen 4 - 8 Feb

Day 85 - 89.  More tiling this week, this time it was the ensuite.  The tiles will look great and they have been done just how I wanted.  I must admit I never thought to ask about the grout colours so the wall tiles have white grout in them and the floor tiles a grey.  The grey blends in with the floor tiles and whilst I would not have picked it the white in the wall tiles actually works and serves to match in with the white sink and will also match when the window and door surrounds are painted as they will be white too.

Finishing.  All the surrounds for the windows and doors have been finished now and the door between the ensuite and WIR installed.  The window into the powder room will be of frosted glass which will match the screen that will be in the entry to hide the powderroom door.

The plasterers have been in doing all the patching up on the walls to prepare them for painting and finishing off a couple of bits of cornice.

The missing tiles in the kitchen have also been installed and I am really pleased with the finish.

There has been a lot of work on the outside too.  The front brickwork has been rendered and the plasterboard and finishes under the eaves are being installed.

Week 17 Skirting Boards and Cladding

Week Seventeen 28 Jan - 1 Feb

Day 80 - 84.  It rained most of the weekend and with the outside walls not quite finished the back rooms all had water in around the skirting boards that had been sat in place.  Luckily most of them had not been actually nailed into place so they had the opportunity to dry out before being fixed to the wall.  I will be looking out for signs of swelling or issues with the skirting board but it should be ok as it seemed to dry out really well.  

 

Outside.  The outside brickworkwas finished by the end of the week and most of the cladding was in place outside the study and around the deck area.  The framing around the windows in the cladded area has been done and they have started to install the permanent downpipes. 

Bathroom.  The feature tile in the kids bathroom has also been installed and looks really great.  The feature will run just above the shower screen and over the top of the mirror.

Kitchen.  The kitchen benchtops have been installed and look great, a bit hard to tell in the photos as they are covered with plastic wrap.  By the end of the week the tiling on the splashback had also been nearly completed.  (We were a few tiles short) We got the area behind the oven done but not the area on the wall on the side bench as it is away from the sink and I also eventually want to put a smart screen up on that wall.