Cool!

We had our air conditioning installed today. Yes, I know, it's not very environmentally friendly, and most of the year I doubt we'll use it (it's very warm here in the house after living in a shed!), but for those really bad days (like this one earlier in the year), I'm sure we'll be glad we have it. We were only planning on one unit in the bedroom, but prices were less than we expected, so we have one in the bedroom, and one in the living area. I decided against putting one in DD's room, as I don't think it's good for children to sleep in air conditioning. For one thing, they adjust to it, just as someone in a colder climate adjusts to that climate, and find it hard to live without it later (DH is a perfect example of this!) I also don't think DD is old enough to monitor her own temperature and set it accordingly yet. If it's a really hot/cold night, she can always join us in our room.

All went well (aside from the larger unit having no gas in it, we're going to have to contact the manufacturer about that), but it was a very unsettled day having people in our house all day. I had lots of gardening and craft planned for the day, but ended up doing very little. In the end, not wanting to have nothing to show for the day, I pulled out this material I bought at Spotlight a few days ago. It's two metres of poly/cotton (I'd prefer cotton, but couldn't find these colours in the cotton), and it is destined to be a rag rug.

First, I tore all the material into strips, a little over an inch wide. I thought tearing would be faster, and the easiest way to get straight strips, but the little bits of cotton fraying off the sides were a huge hassle. Next time, I think I'd probably fold the material, and cut with a roller cutter.

Then I joined the strips together following the instructions on this cool tutorial. Much better than most places, which suggest sewing them at a 45 degree angle. I joined them in an arranged random pattern (pink, green, pink, pink, green, pink, green, green), as I don't want it to look too neat, but I just can't do random. No matter how hard I try, I think about it too much, and it begins to take on an order of it's own.

Then I rolled it all up into a big ball. I'm planning on crocheting my rag rug, not knitting it, as I don't have big enough knitting needles. I do, however, have this nice large crochet hook, I'm not sure of the exact size, but it has a 10.00 on the side? Isn't my huge ball cool? Oh, you thought the title was about the air conditioning...

Settling in

Sorry for the lack of posts, life has been hectic here as we slowly relocate things down to the house. We're heading for our 3rd night in the new house, and it's finally starting to seem normal(ish). The first day we didn't start till 1pm when the floors were finished, and only got the beds, TV, lounge suite and enough food for the first couple of days. Then yesterday my sister and brother-in-law came over and helped move the rest of the furniture, and push DH's car (who's battery is dead) into the garage into the space we've made. After over a year out of the garage, he's happy to have it back in. Computers got set up late that afternoon, 24 hours after we first started moving.

Today, we've done very little. Arranged our clothes in the new walk in wardrobe, moved a few more of DD's toys down, and generally tidied and arranged things.

Don't have much to report, as that has been taking up all our time lately, but thought I'd just list a few random facts about life in the new house.

• It's approximately 4 degrees warmer than in the shed, which is 5-6 degrees warmer than outside, but feels much warmer than that. I only have one jumper on tonight, where as in the shed, I'd have 2, and still be cold. I think the floor rather than carpet helps a lot.


• The chooks were most bewildered by the whole experience. First morning we let them out, they pecked forlornly at the garage door, wondering where we were. They only discovered where we'd gone this afternoon, and kept peering into the door, jumping back at the noise whenever we opened it.


• DD decided to sleep in her own bedroom, first time ever, on the first night. She stayed there till 11pm the first night, and all night the next one. She's unfazed. Mum and Dad are feeling a little bereft. So much for all the comments that we'd never get her out of our bed though!


• From a tiny little portable wardrobe, we've managed to expand into the walk in wardrobe with no effort. I thought our clothes were going to be lost in there, but it looks quite full.


• The shelves I bought on eBay are exactly the right size, and I had to actually put them together in the wardrobe, as there wasn't enough room to maneuver them in afterwards!

Posts might be a bit thin on the ground here for the next few days, as there is still lots more things to be moved, organised and tidied. We're all thrilled to finally be in here though, and plan on really enjoying the rest of DH's days off.

Moving Day!

Floors were finished at about 1pm today. We're in the process of moving in. May or may not be back later for a more comprehensive post.

Still waiting....

Nope, sorry to say that there is no nice picture of our new floors tonight. The contractors turned up, checked the floors, and they needed a tiny bit of leveling in the main walkway areas (around front and back doors), so they put down some concrete type stuff, then went away to let it dry. They'll be back tomorrow morning to start laying, and will finish off on Saturday.

Aside from the obvious disappointment in the fact that I have no floors to photograph, I'm not really that upset. It's better to have it done properly, and since DH is working through the weekend, we couldn't move until at least Monday anyway.

The rain is putting a damper on everything right now too. It's not good heavy tank filling rain, just continuous (all day without letup even for a few minutes!) dribbly rain. Enough to mess up the road again, nearly got bogged on the way in this afternoon, and to make everything muddy and miserable. We've also discovered that the pipe that we hit the other day seems to still have a leak, as it's hole filled up much more quickly than all the others. Can't do much about it till the rain stops though.

Murphy's Law

I suppose I should not be surprised, it has been the way of things since starting building, but none the less, today's drama takes the cake.

Our laminate flooring is booked in to be installed tomorrow. Since the contractor wanted to be paid on the day, and the bank wanted the floors installed before they would give us the money, yesterday we sent in all the forms for collecting a bank cheque. Bank arranged it all no problem, but made the mistake of sending the cheque direct to the contractor instead of for us to collect. Not a big problem, at least the money was arranged we thought.

Until I got a call from the contractor today, just confirming a booking, and in the process of explaining about the payment to them, I discovered that their head office had moved 12 months ago, and the invoice I had had the old address on it! So our cheque was effectively 'lost in the mail'.

A few phone calls later, and it was cancelled and a new cheque arranged, but we were a little concerned there. Murphy must really be out to get us on this, because if only one of those mistakes had been made, we would have been fine, but the combination of both was just too much.

Still, it's all organised now, so hopefully (touch wood yet again) it will all go smoothly now. I spent the afternoon down moving all the plants into the laundry/bathroom/toilet, where there are tiles, then mopping the rest of the house. I'm so glad I took the time to do this, as there was plaster dust everywhere. I had to keep getting fresh water every few square metres, as it was just so dusty. The thought of all that dust being trapped under our floors is scary.

All done now though, and hopefully tomorrow I'll be posting that the floors are down, and the house is finally finished! Stay tuned.

Learning a new skill - Plumbing

Well, the last 2 days have been.... interesting. We've been trying to hook our new house up to our stainless steel tank, rather than to mains water which the builders did. It seemed like an easy enough job in the beginning. Cut a few pipes, join in a few new ones, no big deal.

Which might have been the case if it weren't for the fact that all the pipes were under the ground, and not at all where we expected them to be. I should have paid more attention when they were laying them, but at the time, with a 3yo demanding my attention, it didn't even occur to me.

So after several hours of digging holes all over the yard, trying to work out where on earth the pipes actually went, and which direction the water was flowing in, we managed to put a mattock through a pipe. Bound to happen I guess, but very stressful at the time, involving much swearing and angst. Luckily it wasn't a particularly bad pipe to hit, if you had to hit one. This is the pipe that takes the water from the gutters to the water tank, so not high flow, and most importantly, not sewerage (the sewerage pipes go nowhere near this area, that at least I was sure of!) We made the wonderful discovery that there are fibreglass patches available for just this occurrence, which saved us much cutting of pipes and more swearing. Thank goodness for the helpful staff at Bunnings!

Finally, after disconnecting many pipes, and finding out which taps no longer worked when disconnected, we managed to work out which pipes were which. Then we decided to sleep on the problem, and the next morning, we managed to actually change over the pipes! This shows the mains water now diverted up to a stopper on the end of the pipe (later to become a mains tap, just in case we need it), and the tank water joined straight through to the house. A brief test seems to show that we're now running on tank water, but we need to change our carbon block filter before the final test.

We also spent the afternoon sweeping out all the mud/clay that had been traipsed into the house in the last few weeks, and scraping all the drips of paint/putty that was in lumps on the concrete, meaning we're all ready for the floors to go in on Thursday. It's starting to seem like we might actually get to move into this house after all!

Plodding along...

I know, I know, I've been very slack in posting for the last few days. We've basically been spending the time working out what still has to be done to the house before we can move in, and slowly arranging it all. Not particularly interesting to write about, but I'll summarise here for completeness.

• Floors will go in on the 24th.
• Currently trying to arrange electrician to run phone cable, put in an extra phone plug for the computers (to save running an extension cord right across the living room floor), and put in one extra power point near the existing phone jack. Hopefully Thursday, if the man we talked to today gets back to us
• Bought a set of shelves on eBay for the walk in wardrobe. It only has one top shelf, and hanging space, so we need something there for everything else. Picking it up tomorrow afternoon
• Trying to work out how to hook up our rainwater instead of mains. We've found one outlet into the house, but still need to work out where exactly the pipe goes after that. We're also having an issue with the pump not kicking in properly. Hopefully it's just the filter needing changing, we'll check that tomorrow.
• Curtains were stressing me out for a while mainly due to not knowing exactly what I wanted. I have some sheets for temporary curtains while we decide what we want, but I didn't want to put up curtain rods only to want something different once these decisions were made. Solved this by putting up some temporary curtain rods of that stretch wire with hooks at either end. Cheap, and easily pulled out and replaced for something permanent later.
• Still trying to get rid of the paint smell, which is quite strong. We're opening up all the windows and doors each day, and I'm filling the house with as many indoor plants as I can find. Hopefully it will lessen by the time we're ready to move in.

We still need to:

• Arrange for locks for some doors, only the screen doors on the sliding doors have key locks! The others lock from the inside, but can't be unlocked from the outside, how silly is that?
• Fence the front yard, and start preparing it for planting
• Pavers around the edge of the house. Looked this weekend, and there are lots listed in the weekend shopper, so we should be able to find something relatively easily.
• Decide on air conditioning unit, and arrange installation

This last list won't be done in any hurry though, they're things that can wait until after we've moved in if necessary. Hopefully we'll be in our new house by the end of the month!

1000 words

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. What words do you think this one represents?

Yet another delay...

I really should have found some actual wood to touch after writing this post saying the house was nearly there. As usual, I should never have expected any stage to go smoothly!

The valuer from the bank came out yesterday to assess the house before making final payment and, as I have been TELLING the builders for the last couple of months, refused to pass it because the floors have not been laid. They say the house is not complete. The only way they'll do it is to take the allowances out of our contract, and the bank will pay them to us instead (after the floors are laid of course!) Which on the surface of things seems simple enough. All they need is a new invoice from the builders, showing the adjusted amount.

Of course, actually getting that from the builders is next to impossible! DH has spent half the day on the phone to them today, only to be told at 5:30pm tonight, that he needs to fill in a form before they will do it! Now why on earth has this not been mentioned in the other 5-6 phone calls he's made about this today? And, of course, they can't actually send us the form now, so that we can fill it out. We have to wait till tomorrow.

Seriously, by the time we get into this house, I'm going to be old and grey, and I'm not sure whether it will be the stress of the process, or the amount of time that has lapsed, that will do it first.

Nearly there (touch wood)

Well, it's been quite a slog, but it seems we are nearing the end of this building journey! The house is, for all practical purposes, completed. There are a few minor things left to do, like the washing line being installed, and the front screen door being put on (the one they bought was the wrong size, so they had to get another one), but other than that, it's done. Now we're just waiting on the bank to sort out the final payment, then we should get the keys.

Of course, even once that is done, it won't be time to move in. We'll still have to arrange to have the floors installed, the phone connected, curtain rods put up, and many other little details. Still, hopefully it won't be long now.

A Mouse!

Well, we caught our mouse, although not through any cleverness on my part. I set an elaborate trap (a weet-bix in the bottom of a deep plastic box), which was totally unsuccessful. But when I went to pull the rubbish bin out to clean out DD's paint tin, a sudden scrabbling made me jump out of my skin. The little mouse had climbed in, and couldn't get back out. Lucky the bin was empty! He's now been relocated.

Of course, no sooner had we come back from taking him to his new home, than DH saw another mouse run across the bathroom floor. Seems there is no end to them.

And just in case you're wondering, no luck on the house front either. They still haven't turned up to do the last bits (mainly putting on the security screens). We've been assured they'll be there tomorrow morning, but I've heard that before. So we're still waiting...

I'm still here

No, I haven't dropped off the face of the earth, just haven't been doing anything interesting to post about! Or rather, I've been doing lots, but not actually finishing stuff.

The daily planting is going so so. I had several days there where I didn't plant anything through a combination of no compost to plant into, and being busy trying to get the house organised. I have planted about 2 sqm of peas, which is something. Peas seem to be one of those things that you can just never get enough of, so I'm just planting as much ground as I can with them. I don't think we'll have any trouble with any of them going to waste. From a self sufficiency standpoint though, I think you'd be much better off planting beans.

The organisation was far more successful than my daily planting has been. Almost everything is mouse-proof now, and I'm feeling far more in control. Yes, we still have at least one mouse, and he's none too impressed with my anti-mouse campaign. I discovered this morning that the plastic container I put the chooks scraps into had been gnawed, unsuccessfully I might add. Tonight it's in the fridge, and I have plans to set a 'mouse trap'. No, not a traditional one, one of my own devising. I'll update if we have any success.

Progress on the house has been discouraging as usual. Very little has actually happened, despite repeated calls to the supervisor and the company. I think they're just getting annoyed at us! We did receive a letter today though telling us that practical completion is expected to be achieved tomorrow. I'll believe it if and when I see it. Either way, I'll have to ring the flooring company that we'd booked for Monday, and reschedule yet again. Even if the house is finished tomorrow, it will take several days to organise all the bank/money. Hopefully the end is in sight...

Today I darned DD and my slippers, and a pair of DH's socks that were wearing thin. The potatoes are starting to poke their leaves up, as are the carrots. I have a flower on my peach tree, and tiny mulberries on the mulberry tree. The chickens have taken to coming INTO the shed at about 10am, and again at about 3pm, trying to tell us they want food.

Getting Close Now!

A couple of days ago, our second tank went in, and it was all connected up to our roof. The building company only put in enough allowance to have 2 downpipes connected, but we paid the extra to have the whole roof (about 115 sqm) connected up. Hopefully it will fill quickly. As you can see, we've had a bit of rain since it went in, but mostly the annoying drizzle that the vegie garden loves, but not enough to really fill up the tanks.

The second tank is the same size as our stainless steel one, but is dug half under the ground to bring it below the roofline so that gravity will fill it. The water will run down the downpipes (with screens at the top), along a pipe under the ground, then back up the pipe on the side of the tank. Though the pipes will remain filled with water (there is a drain on the other side to flush them periodically), the screens will keep mosquitoes or bugs out.

Now all that is left really is connecting up the hot water and temperature test, clean up, and the final council inspection. We still don't expect to be in before the end of the month, what with paperwork etc, and getting the flooring done. Hopefully the end is in sight now though.

Hanging in the Balance

That's how life feels right now. The house is really nearing completion, and we all feel like we're in a holding plan. It seems barely worthwhile putting a lot of effort into organising here in the shed, as we're so close, yet still we know there's another week or more of building, then we still have to get the floors installed and a few other bits and pieces, before we can move in.

We had the electrician here today, putting in the stove, switches and lights, so that's one more step done. Of course, peering through the windows I can see that they've used ordinary globes, not energy saving ones! Those will be changed before we even move in. I think they have 10 packs at Bunnings! The water tank has arrived, but is sitting on it's side in it's space. Hopefully we don't get another high wind like the ones we had the other day, or it would go over. I'll try to take a pic tomorrow to post.

I think this is one of the most stressful periods of this building journey, almost as stressful as when we were waiting for the shed to be done so we could move in here. I'm trying to distract myself with mulching the fruit trees, working in the garden (going to need to put a fence up, the chooks have discovered my seedlings), and planting out some cuttings ready to go into the house as soon as we have keys. But I spend a lot of time flitting from one thing to another, never achieving too much.

DH has the weekend off though, so hopefully there will be some progress outside, and some pictures to post tomorrow!

Tiling is Done!

Yet another step on our road to actually having a house that might be a bit warmer than this shed! I totally love these blue tiles, and can't wait till I can do my washing in this beautiful, bright laundry!

And, of course, have a shower in this lovely shower. It looks a little dirty already though!

We're all getting a bit frustrated about the non-finished state of the house right now. The date we've been given for completion now is June 3rd, DD's 4th birthday. While it would be a nice birthday present, it would have been even nicer if we could have been moved in, so we could have a nice party in our new house! Apparently the problem is getting the water tank delivered, which I can well believe, water tanks are hard to come by in Brisbane with this drought going on. They're selling out faster than they can get them in. I would have thought they could have ordered it early enough to prevent this problem though!

We might not be so impatient, but it's getting COLD in this shed. The minimum night temp is hovering down in the low teens, and while it isn't too bad once you're in bed, typing on the computer at this time of night makes for cold fingers, and it's very hard to get going in the morning. I suspect that part of it is due to the concrete floor and the shade trees that were so wonderful at keeping us cool in summer making it seem cooler than it actually is. Once you're outside in the sun, it's quite pleasant, but otherwise, well, lets just say I'm very busy knitting slippers and warm clothes for everyone! (Hopefully some more pics of those soon, I've nearly perfected my slipper pattern I think.)

Painting is Done!

And the doors are hung. Finally got a look inside today after the builders had left, and it's looking nice. Really starting to look like a house now that it's all the one colour! The paint smell is awful though! This is the view from the kitchen, looking down the hallway to the bathroom and bedrooms.

And this is the badly stitched together view in the other direction, looking towards the kitchen. As you can see, I have a good view of DD's cubby from any of the windows in the main living areas. This was definitely planned! Sorry about the quality of the photos, I had to take them with DD's point and shoot, as my lens doesn't have a wide enough angle.

And since they were sitting there, these are the floor tiles for the laundry, bathroom and toilet, a very pretty blue.

I think the wall tiles are white, but I can't remember for sure. This is the accent tiles though, again, blue. Yes, I like blue!

And, since today is the 9th, and the house isn't finished, I guess the expected completion date wasn't worth much! Hopefully in a few weeks...

Solar!

I was doing the washing up this afternoon, and I just happened to glance down the hallway and out the door, and this was the view that greeted me! Our solar (hot water) panels are on! No storage tank yet, but it's a start. I guess they must have gone on today, as there were about 4 cars/ute's here today doing stuff. I thought they were all painting, but I guess not.

The painting does appear to be done though. With a spray by the looks of things. Can't see inside because the windows are all covered, but I can see where the spray has gone over the plastic covers. It's very good to see some progress, after about 2 weeks of NOTHING. I don't see any way it will be done by the 9th, but hopefully in the next few weeks.

Edited to say: I keep coming back to look at this picture, and it gives me a great deal of satisfaciton. I think it sums up our new house far more than any picture of the actual house could. The water tank in the foreground, solar panels on the roof, and gum trees (not on our place) in the distance. I finally feel like we're starting to get there!

A Tree Stump

This tree stump has been sitting down the side of our house, where it was dumped after it was pulled out of our house foundation, and we have forgotten about it. Moving it didn't even make my To Do list, but we realised that with our second water tank due to arrive any day now (actually, it was supposed to arrive on Monday, but still isn't here!) that it had to come out now. When the water tank is in place, it will make accessing that side of the house much harder, and we needed good access to get this out.

We did try pulling it out with a rope, but it snapped immediately, so DH borrowed a heavy duty chain from our neighbours. I'm quite impressed that my little car managed to shift this, it's huge!

Once we had pulled it out of the heap of dirt it's been sitting in for the last 4 or 5 months, DH took to it with the chainsaw. We only use it infrequently, so we just have a little electric one, but it actually does a pretty decent job. Better, in fact, than the electric one we hired to try to take out this stump's predecessor.

Even after we cut a wheelbarrow load of firewood off it, it was still huge. But we didn't have any more time to devote to cutting it up, as we had other plans for the day (namely, a trip to the museum with DD.)

So we hooked it up to the car again, and dragged it up out of the way. Ripped up the lawn a bit, and yes, it probably wouldn't have if we'd dragged it on the flat bit, but it was too much effort to tip it over.

Here is DH standing on the stump in victory! Not quite sure what we're going to do with it now. Perhaps have a very big bonfire? Toast some marshmallows?

9th May

Yes, that is the 'expected completion date' on our house! We are in the final stage now. It seems like the painting is holding things up, as so many things can't be done until after that. They don't put the security screens on, do the tiling, or put on the electrical switches until after the paint. Reasonable of course, because that way they can be sure they won't get paint on them.

So, any bets on whether the house will actually be finished by then or not? I think it's a reasonable estimate, but not holding my breath, as you never know what will come up between now and then!

Of course, even after handover, we won't be able to move in straight away, as we'll still have to arrange to have the floor laid (builder only did carpet, we'll be having laminate). I also want to wait a week or two to give the walls and floor a bit of a chance to off gas.

Front View!

You probably don't realise it, but all the pictures I take of our house are actually from the backyard, so the back of the house. We don't usually see the front much ourselves, except as we drive past, so I tend to forget it. I was walking around today though, and since I was down near the front, I thought I'd take a pic. So here it is! I couldn't get far enough back to take it in one shot, so I had to stitch it together in photoshop. Didn't do the greatest job either, as I can see now, but oh well, you get the general idea.

They came around today and did the first clean up. Took most of the rubbish (luckily we'd salvaged much before this point), and leveled the area around the house so that it slopes away from the brickwork. I suspect we'll have to work on drainage after it's all finished though, as the block slopes from the back to the front, and we'll end up with a lot of water around the house if we're not careful.