The next stage

When I started this blog, I remember thinking that I would update every second day because when I was following other blogs, it became annoying that I had to wait so long between posts to get updates. Well, my good intentions seem to have let me down in favour of life getting in the way and time flying too quickly. I feel like I should be confessing...."forgive me bloggers, for I have not blogged. It's been 3 weeks since my last blog...!"

The house is starting to look really awesome. All our windows are in and our rumpus room stacker doors are installed. They look fabulous. We are still waiting on the bifold doors for our living/dining rooms, but they haven't been delivered yet. I kind of get the feeling that they were ordered a bit late, but never mind. The rest of the house has cracked on and M can't send us the next invoice until the house is at complete lock up stage, so I'm not in a hurry. I also don't want to get to lock up stage because then we can't get in! 

The gyprock internal walls and ceilings are in too. It took the tradies a lot longer to do our house than normal and they had to work on a Saturday to complete the job. It is also a lot harder to do when the main living area (entrance, living, dining, kitchen and butlers pantry) are all square set finishes and not cornice. This means the cutting of the gyprock has to be so precise. The tradies even made comments like, "this house is so big" and "this house is killing me". I just laughed it off because that's your job, mate! 

After the gyprock guys had been, the next batch of guys came in to smooth off all surfaces, seal the holes made in error, sand the whole house and make it ready for paint. That seemed to take a few days too, but the walls feel lovely and smooth so I think they've done a good job. 

Next was the cornice in the rumpus room, bathrooms, laundry and bedrooms. That's been done and looks good too. Our internal doors have been delivered and piles and piles of long, thin strips of wood. It was only today that I realised that there are various sizes and lengths and today all the internal doors were put in the correct rooms, along with cut to size wood strips, to be used for the architraves. So the arcs will be done this week and the doors hung. We have gone for solid wood doors on the bedrooms and bathrooms, but the main bedroom, powder room and laundry have frosted glass panel insets - I am so happy with them! 

One compromise we had to make on this house was to have the main bedroom at the front of the house. Being a single story, there are only one of 2 places to have the main bedroom - at the front door or overlooking the entertainment area at the back of the house. I don't like either option, so we decided to have the bedroom at the front, but make the bedroom door a feature so we can close the door and it still looks good. So we have gone with cavity slider doors using the doors with the frosted glass inset. Today they were installed and I got a real feel for how it will look. While I did imagine it to be wider, it looks so awesome and lets so much light in.

Work on the outside of the house was also done today. The gyprock finish for under the eaves was done today too. They didn't finish, but they are making progress, so lots of work done by the carpenters today. 

I had a walk through with our ss the other day. Andre has been travelling for 3 weeks so he couldn't attend, but it was great to ask questions and understand how things work and find out what's next. I asked the all important, "when can we move in?" question that must be the most commonly asked question when building. While it's not confirmed, our ss said M is pushing for him to finish our house at the end of August. I said (in all my construction experience!), "impossible!". SS said, "I will be very surprised if you are not in by mid-September". This is so exciting and so much sooner than I had anticipated. Bearing in mind that after handover we will still have to do our driveway, fly screens and flooring, it is highly likely we will be in mid-September. That's really soon!!! 

This week we are meeting with the pool/landscaping contractor on site to get the ball rolling with the engineering drawings we need for council approval. At least if that's done now, we can start on the pool as soon as we move in. I would really love the pool done by Christmas...is that hoping for too much? 

Till next time,

C xx 

The shell starts to get some guts :-)

As per my normal daily routine, I drove past our house at around lunch time and didn't see much going on, although I did see some tradies in the house. And as per my normal daily routine, I took the boys to see the house after school. We were thrilled to see our windows and front door have been installed! It is looking so awesome and I love that we are able to see the house change and develop every day. 

The chose aluminium window frames in woodland grey, all with flyscreens with fibreglass mesh. The bathroom windows are a satinlite finish, not clear glass. I'm really glad I decided on the satinlite finish because the windows are quite large and initially I was going to choose clear glass, but privacy is a bit of a priority for me, so I'm glad I changed my mind :-)

I was also worried about the look of the windows on the front of the house because I kept changing my mind about what I wanted. But in the end, it's a panelled window and it looks fabulous. The rumpus room and living room windows are huge but because they aren't one single pane of glass, they look smaller than they are. I'm not sure I like them though. But we will have venetian blinds over them, so hopefully it will take away the divided window look. I did want a breeze through the house which meant I had to choose the divided window with sliding openings. I will just have to wait and see how it comes together at the end. 

All the cables for the lights and fans were done today and I had a long chat with Tim, the electrician. Apart from the fact that he was quite dishy, he gave me some good insight into how things work and the difference between a single and double story home and the differences between a timber and a metal frame, with respect to the electricals. He also offered to come and put our pendants up in the kitchen, once we have decided on them. I didn't like anything M had to offer when we did all our selections back in February, so I am able to choose my own and Tim offered to put them up for me at a fraction of the cost. I might just take him up on that offer! 

The bath frame in the main bathroom is in and the bifold door frames for the living/dining area out onto the outdoor room have been delivered. The stacker doors and frames and flyscreens for the rumpus room have been delivered too. It's so thrilling to see so much happening, I'm really glad I am able to visit the site daily to see all the progress.

Watch this space for the next exciting episode :-)

C xx

P.S. I have just realised that I am now calling the build our house and not the land anymore! 

Changes on the inside

The roof is finished now and it looks so good! We chose a flat tile, mostly because our covenant dictated a flat tile, in Horizon Barramundi colour. It's a lovely dark grey and goes really well with the Monument fascia boards and gutters. It took the tilers longer than expected to finish the roof because it's quite a large surface area and they were there on Saturday, finishing it off. It looks so good, but I can see 2 chipped and cracked tiles - I wonder if they will fix those. 

Our doors and windows were also delivered on Friday and it was great to see our very large front door in real life. Sometimes it's hard to visualise the actual size of things. The door is the wrong colour, but Andre assures me that the timber is stained on site and the door will be stained in due course. Either he just knows this stuff or he makes an educated guess. Either way, as long as it's done in the correct colour, all will be good.

While we were at the house on Saturday, we noticed that the outside tap was in the wrong position. We also noticed that the floor mounted spout for the freestanding bath in our ensuite looked a little close to the wall and not in the position we stipulated - at the end of the bath, not in the corner. The plan was to ask our ss for a walk through this week since we aren't actually allowed on site and wouldn't have seen these issues from the road. But you know, it's a little hard not to go on to site :-)

On my daily visit to the house yesterday afternoon, we noticed that the aerial has been put up but not the rotary roof vent. I assume that will be done at a later stage. I also saw that all the data cables are in and there was obviously a visit from our ss because there was pink spray paint everywhere. Each room was marked in pink, the doorway sizes were marked, the way the doors open were marked, the bottom of the frames where the doorways are were marked and a bright pink message on the outside tap, "move tap", with an arrow showing where it should be. I also noticed a message on the floor in our ensuite, "check level of bath to window". That was a strange one and had nothing to do with the floor mounted spout that I thought was in the wrong position. It was good to see he had been there. 

Today I drove past at around lunch time (luckily I only live 2km from where we are building!) and I didn't see anyone, so assumed nothing was happening today. But, as usual, I took the boys to see the house after school so we had a look around. I first noticed that the outside tap had been moved and then I noticed the supporting beams inside had been removed too. The frames in the doorways were cut away and then I noticed that all the light switch and plug point frames are in too. It was so cool visualising how to go from one room to the next, turning on lights. 

In the ensuite, the spout has been moved to the correct position, so obviously the cryptic message written on the floor meant something to somebody. The roof scaffolding has also been removed too, so the house looks quite different. 

On another note, not sure if I mentioned before, but every house being built has a place for rubbish to be thrown away - either a makeshift one out of wire or a skip, but it's quite big and can hold loads of rubbish. I assume M arranges for rubbish to be collected at some point. And removing rubbish costs time and money. I am starting to learn that the neighbours know this too because there has been some really strange rubbish in our bin. At first it was old baby equipment, some wood and even an old toothbrush. A few weeks ago there was a bath! A brand new, slightly scratched bath that must have come from somebody else's build. Why they didn't throw it in their own bin, I will never know. The ss told me that to repair a few scratches costs $150 when they can buy a new one for $130, so it's easier to throw it away. Hmmm, not sure I like that kind of waste. This week there was a whole washing machine in our bin! It looks like it has seen better days and has been stripped and pulled apart, but it's still in one piece and very obviously a washing machine. The mind boggles. 

Oh, and the bath has since disappeared....even stranger! 

C x

It's been nearly 2 weeks since my last blog - quite a long time in the building world. I didn't realise that it's been so long since I last blogged. How the time seems to fly when you're having fun. And we are having loads of fun with this house! 

So quite a bit has happened on our house and we are very happy with the progress. Right after the frame for the full house was complete, we had those torrential rains in Queensland at the end of that week (1 May). I have never seen rain like that in my life and it was far worse than the last cyclone rain we had. The roads were literally turned into rivers, parks into ponds and bridges became non existent. The entrance to our new estate in North Lakes, Club North, is a bridge over a stream and that was flooded too. Our soon-to-be neighbour tried to drive through it and the car stalled. She had to walk with her children in the pouring rain only to learn later that the car couldn't be repaired and was written off. That made me a bit nervous because I'm not familiar with such hectic rain and I probably would've tried to drive through too. That night it took people 5 hours to get home, if they were coming from the city. Andre drove home on his motorbike and managed to get home, soaked to the bone, in 1.5 hours. Needless to say, there wasn't any work done on our house those 2 days that it poured. Fortunately Saturday dawned sunny so it gave everything a chance to dry out. 

The following week (last week), the roof trusses went up as well as the gutters. I managed to visit the site on the day the roof trusses were going on and it was a fascinating thing to watch. The crane was massive and I'm always amazed at how few people it takes to do a job. There was one guy guiding the truss into place and 2 on the roof, using a staple gun to keep it in place. It was all securely put in place and then we really got an awesome feel for the house. It feels so spacious and airy. But that could just be because there's no roof, so obviously it feels airy! I even suggested to Andre that we have a glass roof installed because I loved how the sun came through the whole house. But he reminded me of the Queensland summers and I changed my mind :-)

On Monday the scaffolding went up around the roof and the roof tiles were delivered. There were loads of them...22 pallets, each with 250 tiles per pallet. That's a lot of tiles! I thought the tiling would start yesterday, but the sarking was done only. Today the house was wrapped which was a real surprise because I didn't expect that until later. The roof tiles were also put in position on the roof, so I can only assume they will start tiling tomorrow. 

It's been a delight to drive past daily and see how things are progressing. Our ss has been very good too, calling every week like he said he would and giving us an update on the progress. I had to meet him on site last week to sign a variation (more on that later) and he didn't rush me, explained everything well and took his time. I also raised an issue with the height of our ensuite shower niche and he let me on site with him to measure it to make sure. On the first set of plans we have, the height of the shower niche says 1300mm and on the second set of plans it shows 1020mm. We never made the change so we are still not sure how it just changed but it just looked low to me. Upon measuring it, it's actually 950mm high, so not correct at all. But luckily for us, 1300mm is too high, so 1020mm it will be when it gets fixed up. 

Back to the variation we had to sign. The fly screens Metricon were going to supply to us were awful so we had to sign a variation to take them out of our contract. Not too much of a big deal because it is a credit on our contract, but I am waiting to see if they charge us for taking it out. The order for the stacker doors had to change because the original order included a track for the screen and now we don't need it. But it didn't mess Metricon around because they hadn't yet placed the order anyway. I was really hoping we could install the track from the new supplier we found during the build, but it seems that because the new supplier doesn't do work with M, they aren't allowed onsite until after handover at the end. It's not the end of the world because we are doing our floors after handover too, so it will allow our new supplier to have access to the raw slab before the floors go in. The new supplier needs 30mm to install his screens and M only allowed 20mm so the slab will have to be chopped by an extra 10mm. But not the end of the world, at least I get what I want. 

It's all going well so far, can't believe it has been 6 weeks since we started building, such fun. 

C xxx

We have action!

It's been such an exciting week. The slab wasn't poured last Monday as was scheduled because of the forecast of rain and it wasn't until I checked with the ss on Wednesday night, that he told me it was scheduled for Thursday. I'm so glad I checked because the boys and I really wanted to see the pour. We left for school a little earlier on Thursday to go past the land and there they were, full steam ahead, working with the concrete. When we arrived at 7:50am, the outdoor room and portico had already been finished so we stayed to watch the huge pump pour the concrete over our garage area. It was such a thrill to see.

By Thursday afternoon the pour was complete and the slab was rock hard. The frames were also delivered on Thursday and on Friday the roof trusses were delivered too. We are so fortunate to have an empty block of land next to us as the deliveries have all had place to be kept without disrupting the flow of traffic or the neighbours. Of course we were at the land on Saturday for a real look and to try and get a feel for the size of the rooms and the locations, but it wasn't until we went yesterday that we really got to see the house taking shape. 

The frame is up for most of the house except the bedrooms (main is done), kitchen, laundry and butlers pantry. We arrived as the fencing guys were putting up the fence around the property to ensure "people" don't walk on the slab and get injured with a stray nail. I was peering through the fence and taking photos from far but the fencing guy invited to take me for a walk on our slab and see the framing up close. I was so excited! 

I am a bit concerned that our ensuite is too small, but the outdoor room and living areas are a great size. Jake's bedroom is the perfect size and he loved imagining where his bed and other furniture would go. The other 2 bedrooms weren't framed yet, so we will wait and see what those feel like soon. It's all still quite surreal actually, seeing it go from a 2D drawing to a 3D home...I still can't quite believe we are building a house. 

I have taken loads of photos but I have struggled to sync them from my phone to computer. Going to try for the millionth time again. 

The fly screen saga continues. We have found a supplier that can help us with screens that don't need a supporting pillar to work, but it's not one of Metricon's suppliers so we have to jump through a few hoops first. But our ss has told us not to worry, we will sort something out. I think we may even have to do them after handover, but we will have to see what happens.

C

No progress yet

We were very excited at the prospect of our slab being laid yesterday but it didn't happen. Andre made arrangements to go into work later so that he could see the slab being poured and I had the kids get ready earlier so we could go and see the pour before school, but there was nothing happening on our site. I went twice more during the day but it still hadn't been touched. I had seen the concreter last week doing the prep for the pour and both he and our Site Supervisor (SS) told us the pour would happen yesterday but there was obviously a problem because it didn't happen. Needless to say, we have not been contacted to let us know there is a delay. So we wait.

But another more pressing issue for me is our fly screens. I hate having insects/flies/mosquitos inside so it was non-negotiable that we have fly screens in our house, not only on all windows, but on the doors leading outside too. We have chosen beautiful, extra tall, timber stacker doors for our dining/living area that lead out onto our outdoor room. But since they are stackers, they need a special kind of screen that has to be built in at the time the doors are being put in, so we chose to do the screens with Metricon's supplier. They weren't cheap, but I was adamant that I had to have them. 

On the weekend, we visited the Build and Design Centre in the city so that I could see the floor that we have chosen, laid out. I have only seen a sample and we knew there was a floor laid out there that we could see and visualise how our floors would look. They look awesome and we are really thrilled that we have chosen a bamboo floor. But on our way through the centre, we saw a supplier of the fly screens showing 2 different options - a retractable option that folds away into a cavity built into the wall or a pleated version that folds in on itself and sits neatly against the wall. We then realised that we didn't actually know which one we had chosen and I really hoped it wasn't the pleated version because I absolutely hated it. It looks flimsy and old fashioned and not anything like I had in mind. 

When we got home, we looked at our variations and saw a description, but not a model number so we had to call Metricon yesterday to find out what we had actually selected. Turns out that we had actually selected the pleated version :-( Since we have chosen a cornerless stacker door option, there is nowhere for the retractable screen to connect to and so we have to have the pleated version. But we may be able to go with another supplier and then have to chat to the construction team to see if they will allow us to use a different supplier to install the correct screens during the build. I am waiting for a call back from the new screen supplier to see if they can accommodate us and then we will have to ask Metricon if they will allow us to use them. Watch this space! 

My pet peev..

If there is one thing that absolutely gets my back up is people not doing what they say they will. I don't deal with being let down very well and unfortunately I have had a lot of that in the process of building our house. Definitely not the case with Metricon and our customer support co-ordinator, Helen. She was absolutely fantastic and we never had to wait for a response or an answer. Helen was absolutely on the ball and was always one step ahead of us. I wish we could've met her in person. 

One pool builder in particular was recommended to us and it was a mission trying to get him to come and see us. We had to follow up and follow up but eventually he came over one night and gave some good advice and definitely knew what he was talking about. He promised a quote and a 3D drawing within 2 weeks of seeing us. That was in January. We are still waiting. However, we got an email from them this week asking how our project is going. Huh? Does he know we are waiting for him?! 

Anybody building a house will know you need all the quotes first for all the different parts to the build (house, pool, landscaping, fencing, driveway etc) to get mortgage approval and while I got the impression that the tradies I spoke to all knew this process, there were so many that just didn't get back to me. I found this extremely frustrating and definitely delayed things for us. I wonder if it's a general thing with tradies or if that was just our experience. I certainly understand they are busy, but we have dollars to spend and that didn't seem to mean anything to them. In the end, we found a brilliant pool company who quoted for the pool and landscaping, so if we decide to go with them, I will certainly let you all know who that is. 

Waiting, waiting, waiting....

I'm not that good with waiting. Especially when I know there is nothing I can do about it, except be patient. Patience is not my strong point and I have to physically find something else to do to keep me occupied so I don't feel like I'm bouncing off the walls. 

Apart from the ground being scraped last Thursday, nothing much else happened this week. The stones for the driveway were delivered and spread evenly for the delivery trucks to use to get onto our land and a porta-loo was delivered. Oh, and a square fence like structure that will be used as a bin. I have been going to our land so often, each time hoping I could see something different. But other than the muddy puddles drying up, there was nothing new to see. I have a bit of an obsession with going to see our land, you see. For weeks it's been our little routine on a Saturday morning to go to the drive thru Gloria Jeans for a half strength, skinny, extra hot latte for me and a large capp for Andre and gingerbread biscuits for the boys, and then drive to our land. We have watched weeds grow, seen a peg disappear, wondered who is mixing cement on our land and noticed wheel tracks on our land, but not much else has happened there. 

But it's through visiting our land that we have met some neighbours, seen how quick the framing process is and played in the water-filled shower cut outs after the rain we had. I have also taken my paint samples to hold against another house down the road because I was worried that they might look like the house down the road whose house is very dark. We have met some tradies and made contact with some fencing and landscaping guys doing work around us which can come in really handy down the track. Andre says I should stop going past so often because the tradies will think I'm stalking them. And they aren't even doing our build! Imagine when they are! 

And today something happened. Today we were told the plumbing was going in, so I went around at about lunch time and boy, there was something happening. The plumber was digging the holes and drains were going on. The electrician was doing his thing and the electrical box was going on. We didn't stay long but I took a few pics and then popped around again (I told you I had an obsession) at around 5 and all the holes were covered up and the pipes are all sticking out the ground. I was a little disappointed that it had gone so quickly because I wanted Andre to see what they were doing and how they do it, but now he can only see the pipes. I can see exactly where each room is and what the pipes are for. The plumber very kindly took me onsite and showed me where the markings of our house are and explained how the measured 3 times to be sure they were doing the right thing and showed me where the drain pipes will go, where the stormwater drain runs out and how the pipes are laid to make way for the pool. The plumber has a very important job because if he measures incorrectly, it could have massive impact on the whole house and once the slab is poured, there is very little you can do to change the pipes without damaging the slab. But we will have another measure and inspection by the site supervisor and the construction manager before the slab is poured next week, so all should be good. 

I will go to the land tomorrow (again) to see if there is any more progress. 

Cheers,

Corrinne

P.S. I wonder when I'm going to start saying "house" instead of "land" :-)

In the beginning....

As I sit here with a cup of coffee in one hand and a bundle of nervous energy in the other, I can't quite believe that I am about to embark on 2 things that I have never done before - one is build a house and the other is write a blog. How perfect to combine the 2 and take both these exciting journeys out on each other. 

My name is Corrinne and I have been married to Andre for just over 13 years. We have 2 gorgeous boys, Jake (aged 6 and three quarters) and Dale (aged 3.5) and are originally from South Africa. We arrived in Australia in January 2013 and live in a beautiful suburb of Brisbane, North Lakes. The intention was always to buy a house but in the beginning we decided to rent for a while to see how things worked, what we liked, if we were going to stay in North Lakes and to save some money. We started actively looking last June and couldn't quite find a house that suited our needs. We knew there were some land releases happening but weren't sure of the process. In the end, things fell into place and we bought an awesome corner block, measuring 845m2. 

It's been 4 days, 4 hours and 21 minutes since our build started. And we have a scraped block and some muddy puddles. Since it's the Easter weekend, nothing else has happened (of course), but my patience can't cope with only the weeds growing and not much else going on. This journey is going to be a really interesting one and I think I will get mild relief from expressing my feelings to my little online psychologist, my blog. 

So come on this journey with me to see how our house and my personality evolves. It's bound to be one hellava ride!