Stairs!

And then there were stairs. Excellent!

Cutting out the void

In preparation for the stairs, which with luck will be in next week, we now have a BIG hole in the roof/floor.

Garden, what garden?

Somewhere underneath this construction site lies my front garden. Oh well, it needed a make over anyway!

Ah, Houston, we have a problem!

Next window out was the kitchen, and all was going well until.....

Well, you tell me, does this window look like it fits this hole.


Answer - Ah, no! Back to tape measure 101 for someone.

Out with the old, and in with the new!

With the upstairs starting to look the goods it's time for some more serious work on the downstairs. First to go are the old timber windows. Probably worth a fortune now if you were to buy them new but they're getting old and they really won't go with the new look, so out they go....

As you can see from these pictures the new front lounge room window will be slightly small than the old. It's necessary for two reasons:

1. The new stair case needs to fit in on the wall behind the window, and

2. The new size window will match the size of the window on the other side of the front wall and make the place a little more symmetrical.

Upstairs Render - Coat Two

After a second coat of render the top of the house is starting to look good. Oh, and just in case you were wondering, like the nosy dog walker who went past this morning and felt she had to comment, yes the bottom half will be rendered as well.

Back Room Flooring - The Old Floor

I touched on this in an earlier post but thought it was worth further mention. The new back room/dinning room and kitchen are now all effectively one room. It's a great space but has produced somewhat of a 'messy' flooring situation. As shown above the three different floors coming together just doesn't look right.

To further complicate things the floor in Caitlin's old room is at a slightly different height to the floor in the kitchen. It was never a problem, or even noticeable when they were separate rooms, but now they are joined together is a little more problematic. In order to even things out before the new hardwood floor goes down over the top the boys from Nelson Constructions aka the builders cut out and replaced a whole section of floor. So now there are four floors all joining together.

Upstairs Render - Coat One

Waterproofing

The laundry and both the new bathrooms were waterproofed this morning in a lovely shade of green. This shot is of the laundry but the bathrooms look identical so there wasn't any point adding more photos. Seen one green floor and you've seen them all.

The New Space

The wooden floor that can be seen in this photograph is the area that was just a few short days ago Caitlin's room. A new wall including space for the double sliding doors has been installed and the wooden path just after the doors and before the carpet is the old hallway. Kitchen off to the right as we are looking at it.

The floor might look a little strange with the three or four different flooring types but will look great, fingers crossed, when the new hardwood flooring goes down.

Water Water Everywhere

Having had enough of the rain over the past few days we found a sure fire method of getting some sunshine....install the water tank. No chance of rain now!

Okay, so it isn't connected yet, but when it is all hooked up I sure we won't see a drop for months.

Continued Demolition!

With the walls from Caitlin's room going last Friday today was the day to take down the old hallway and open up the old house a bit.


After a couple of hours of smashing and bashing the builders take a break...

New Back Room

With the addition of Caitlin's room the new back is starting to look a little bigger. Now just the wall between the the kitchen and the bedroom to go and we'll have the full room.

Delayed Demolition

Well, the demolition of Caitlin's room was delayed for a couple of days, and perhaps just as well as it gave her a chance to get use to the idea. Today however the inevitable happened!

Caitlin's Room

Today is a bit of a sad day for Caitlin. The little room in the middle of the house has been hers since she was born, and today it will be demolished to make way for the new dinning room.


While looking forward to her new big room with 'dancing mirrors' (mirrored sliding doors on her cupboard) Caitlin was quite upset saying goodbye to the old room and her stick-on animal companions. I was planning on getting one last photo of her in the room but after watching me move the last of her things out she was in no mood for the camera. Needless to say she wasn't the only one in the house who was a bit emotional.

Sliding Doors

The internal design for our little redbrick calls for the installation of a number of sliding doors...

Above, the frame is installed for one such door in the new laundry. While below, the new style 'runner' his modelled by our resident hand model and builder Josh.

and then there were walls....

and this place is finally starting to take shape...

Roof Roof - Good Dog

"May the roof above us never fall in, and may we good companions beneath it never fall out." - Irish Blessing

They say you never appreciate the importance of a good roof until you don't have one. Well now we finally have one, let's just hope it lasts many a year as when this is all over there's not going to be much in the bank to replace it....

Front Porch Frame

Today the front of our redbrick started to take on a little more of it's final shape with the construction of the frame for the front porch roof.

Stairs!

Finally we don't have to balance down the builders ramp to get down to the backyard and the toilet. Along with the back deck we now have a flash new set of stairs...

Post Holiday Progress

Having spent the last 7 nights cruising the South Pacific visiting ports in New Caledonia, the Loyalty Islands and Vanuatu my thoughts have rarely been on the progress of the house, work, or anything else for that matter. Unfortunately, this came to an end when we got back home and the reality of living in a cold drafty construction site with a outdoor toilet in the middle of winter came crashing home.

At least the builders made some progress, in the form of a new back deck, while we were away....

Taking Shape

With the frame work going up for the roof the house is starting to take shape.


It will be interesting to see what progress is made over the next week while we are away on holidays...