So close, but so far away!

Well, no handover on Friday (we never expected it anyway), however the past few days have seen a lot of activity around the place.

Plaster, paint, tiles and other things have all been worked on. The toilet has been removed, the Tri-lock installed and loads of other things.

Yesterday (Saturday) we picked up our timber laminate flooring from Fowles and took it to the house, as the painter was there and the place was open.

Broken tiles now replaced. Tiler had to bring some tiles over as the mongrel local kids had broken the ones I set aside

Left over roof tiles - now stored in the garage!

Tiler put the last (missing) tile into the bathroom. At the same time he also tiled the splashback in the pantry (picture coming next time)

Balcony has been sealed in preparation for tiles

Toilet and bin have gone

Gas meter now installed

Hand rail now installed - for the first time since painting...

... but the location of the light switch isn't ideal!

This cornice in bedroom 4 was replaced

Quad beading in place in the al fresco.
More painting needs doing here - or should we say, sanding back, then painting.

Drainage from retaining wall now tied into silt pit

Our flooring being delivered

All 47 boxes!

As the place was open for the past couple of days, we took the opportunity to terminate some wiring and put face plates in. More detail on this coming up on the LexCom Blog (see the link at right).

Little bits

Disappointingly, not much has happened since the last blog entry, with the exception that the Painter was back, which allowed us entry into the house - the first time since the cleaner had been through.

I guess all things are relative, but we noticed that while the place was definitely much cleaner than before, there was still a lot of crud stuck to the floor in various places, and people have still been walking up and down the stairs with their workboots. We didn't get one of those "Don't come in with your grotty workboots" signs that M&M had after their clean.

Enough of that. Some photos.

Paperbark colour now above the garage door.

Clean upstairs games area

Cleaner stairs - but with boot prints

Sheets, slab, shed and scumbags.

I like to try and make the title of the blog entries interesting, but sometimes they do require an explanation!

Sheets - Cement sheets went up today on the garage and under the balcony. Looking good! Photos below.

Slab - I swept the concrete slab out the back today, as the shed is going up over the next few days. Photo below.

Shed - As above!

Scumbags - the local scumbag kids have been at it again. I've mentioned them before, and we've had a constant battle with these morons to try and stay on top of the mess they make. Over the past month they have broken some roofing tiles, thrown bricks around, pulled silt pits out, and checked as much crap on the slab as they can find. One of our soon the be new neighbours (who works with Bernadette) happened to be out the front of his home last Saturday and caught the little shits red handed. One of them was tring to force his way in, and two others were generally making as much mess as they could. He went to town on them, and tells us that they seemed to be scared as hell. Hopefully they stay away.

Anyhow, onto more interesting things! The balcony floor and ceiling has been done - the tiler should be back soon to put the tiles on the balcony. The painter is due to come back soon to finish painting. The garage door is in a warehouse in Geelong waiting for the garage ceiling to be painted. The gas flame heater will be going in soon, and there will be a site clean which will improve the place no end.

Met with the Site Supervisor on Saturday, and the render colour that we are seeing is an undercoat - top coat should go on this week. Enough talk - time for pics!

Freshly swept slab. Expect to see a shed on it soon!

Balcony floor

Not vandalism - this is where the heater is going.

Neat job in the garage

Plastering done in the garage - now waiting for paint.

Same goes for the front of the garage - waiting for paint.

Under the balcony - We were amazed that a solid ceiling wasn't standard!

Last Saturday we also went shopping for a few lights to replace the junction boxes which are installed in various place around the house.

Stair lights are 240V LED units which give off a pale blue colour, and should look pretty good:

The pendant light which will go over the dining table:

We also bought a fan for the bedroom - and we know which lights we want for the front of the balcony, but haven't bought them as yet. Cheers!

Vanity Raised

After a few weeks of waiting the vanity in our ensuite was raised on Saturday morning. We were lucky enough to be visiting the house at the time the fitter arrived.

Not much else has happened since the tiler left. The plaster under the al fresco has been painted, and that's about all.

New kicker has been delivered

Painted ceiling

Installation of new kicker in progress

All done! Much nicer.

Locked out

Thanks for the feedback yesterday on feature walls. Bernadette is keen on the full treatment, but I'm not so sure (which actually doesn't make any difference!). I've included another picture to help the decision.

House was locked up today, so shots are from outside. Tiles have been delivered, stairs stained, garage doors painted, and I have the pictures to prove it!

The picture of a Cremorne display home - painted features

Rear garage door painted

Garage internal access door (see, we do have one!)

Tiles have been delivered

Stairs stained - with a sign at the bottom telling people to stay off!

Roof is all done on the back of the house

Features

Lots of photos today. The Painters will be finished by the end of the week and they are currently sanding the stairs in preparation for staining. Yes - we went for solid timber stairs which will be stained and clear coated.

Other things to happen over the past few days are the rear door to the garage, feature walls, doors hung, glass fixed, and the phone line physically connected. Enjoy!

Looks like a real house with the garage roof on

Feature wall in the home theatre. It's a dark colour (called 'Vinyard') and it's difficult to take a good photo of. It's also difficult to paint - the painter is having a few problems with it because of the base, but he will sort it out, and it looks great!

Feature wall in the master bedroom is called "Donkey". No jokes please....
We are thinking of extending the feature colour onto adjoining walls. Your opinion?

Doors have been re-hung and look great!

Stairs are being sanded

Our broken windows has been fixed.

Pantry apparently need another coat, but looks terrific.

Painting has started in the alfresco

Rear cladding has been painted

Rear door has been installed in the garage

Front door painted

Telstra licensed installer has connected the copper

Tiles and more paint.

Tiles! Roof tiles that is. Visited the house yesterday and the painters were still hard at it (and will be until late this week). The roof tilers were also on site and were tiling the garage, and finishing the tiles over the rumpus room.

The paint is really staring to make the house look livable. More pictures (of course!)

Carpet and Laminate

Not much in the way of photos today, as there's nothing much new to see.

Yesterday we visited Fowles to order our carpet and flooring. As mentioned in a previous post, we decided to go for Godfrey-Hirst Milano Caramel Kiss for the carpet, and Armstrong Armalock Cherry Spice laminate timber flooring.

We will install the laminate ourselves, and save a bundle. The only drama is one of timing - to get the best result, the laminate needs to go down before the carpet. Looks like some time off work to install the laminate once we get handover!

The following shots come from the Fowles brochure - so the images are not great. The Milano has a small pattern (a regular square of loop carpet). Caramel Kiss isn't shown below - it's a .. errr.. caramel colour.




One tip - at Fowles you can see a whole roll of the carpet, which actually looks lighter than the sample because of the size. Carpet looks a bit lighter when you install it. Paint looks a bit darker once applied. Check out the roll of carpet is you can!

A big hello to Darren and Kelly (hope I spelt your names correctly). We met Darren and Kelly at Fowles as they too were ordering their floor coverings. D&K have a terrific modified version of the Hamilton 34 which is almost due for handover, and could see that we were also building with PD.

Thanks for the tip guys, however it didn't work out for us - can't win 'em all! Hope to catch up with you both again.

Our CSC left a message telling us that painting is due to be completed by 23rd May.

In case you are interested, here's our current 24/7 status:



Have a good one!

Paint - everywhere!

Painters have been hard at it, spraying and rolling the paint. We visited the house today and took some interior photos while the painter was working. The interior walls you see in the photos below are Wattyl "Feather White".

Feature walls get painted right at the end.

This photo shows the door exterior has been started, and you can see the plastic on the windows.

Family room with sealer and one coat.

Doors are removed and then painted

Upstairs games room

Study

A coat on the front doors

Even the shelves have had the treatment

Protection everywhere

Kitchen

Our pantry with the shelving installed

Looking through to the theatre room

Colours for the Girls!

Over the past couple of days there's been a lot of painting activity - the windows have plastic on them, and we can't really see in. We hope to bring you some update photos tomorrow, but in the meantime here is our colour selection summary, as promised!


Late update: Paint selection colours are -

External:

• Front door (external face): Wattyl Gloss Enamel - Gravel Chip
• Laundry Door (external face): Wattyl Sunfast low sheen - Colourbond Woodland Grey
• Garage Door (external face): Wattyl Sunfast low sheen - Colourbond Woodland Grey
• Meter Box: Wattyl Sunfast low sheen - Colourbond Woodland Grey
• Mouldings: Wattyl Sunfast low sheen - Colourbond Paperbark
• Infill above garage: Colourbond Paperbark
• Alfresco Beams: Colourbond Paperbark
• Render: Rockcote Maudsland

Internal:

• Ceilings: Wattyl White
• Standard wall colour: Wattyle Low Sheen washable velvet - Feather White
• Main bedroom feature wall: Low sheen washable velvet - Donkey
• Theatre room: Low sheen washable velvet - Vinyard
• Architraves / Skirtings: Australian Colonial 67mm profile, Wattyl Easyflow gloss in Orchid
• Internal Doors: Wattyl Easyflow gloss in Orchid
• StaircaseHandrail, Treads, Risers: Woodcare New Maple
• Ballustrades: Wrought iron, plain profile, in black

Lots of activity!

Quite a lot of activity over the past few days - work was happening on Friday and Saturday. We have the gutter and fascia installed on the garage, the remaining brickwork completed, the fix all but complete, the painting started, cabinets all in, shelves all in, all doors hung - and more!

Sorry - lots of pictures, may take a while to load!

It seems there was a bit of a screw up with the height of the vanities in the ensuite. The cabinet should be another 118 mm from the floor, which would bring the bowls up to the correct height under the taps. The pictures below show you what I mean.

These cupboards should be over 300mm from the floor. Originally, they were to be "floating" (mounted on the wall), however PD changed the specifications as they don't do the floating ones any longer.

If you look closely, you can see the mark on the wall where the top of the bowl should be (yep, I went in with the tape measure!).

The main bathroom vanity

Fascia and gutter for garage delivered last Friday....

....and installed the next day!

Our Blanco sink. Not fitted as Caeserstone bench tops will be going in later.

Enamel paint on the window frames

and again

our kitchen taking shape

Laminate shelf in the pantry

Dishwasher space

cupboards next to the fridge space

laundry cupboards and basin

Glo-tub in white

Downstairs Powder room

Plaster inspection revealed many issues - here are a few of the marks.

Master Bedroom doors are hung

Brick sills completed in the al fresco

Today (Sunday) we visited Fowles to finalise the colours for the laminate floor boards and carpet. We borrowed a door from the kitchen and took it with us to determine what would look best. For all you colour freaks out there, we decided on the Cherry Spice Timber Laminate, and the Godfrey-Hirst Milano Caramel Kiss.

Current catalog (in case you are interested) is here!

Paint 'n space

Plasterer was on site today, along with the painters. Plasterer said that he's spending so much time here that he might move in! All that needs to be done now is the cornice (from what I can see).

Painters started under the eaves at the front, and looks like they ran out of paint. Some of the steel lintels above the windows have also been done.

I went to take a look upstairs, and guess what - no more ladder. In fact, no more anything. Empty space where our staircase will go.

Just as well the staircase has been delivered!

There won't be any updates for a few days as your friendly blogger will be away. You get a rest for a few days, and I get to do a big update (hopefully!) when I get back!

Kitchen

Hallway, towards front door

Our ladder is gone!

Staircase has been delivered

Looking up at the second level - standing where the staircase will go.

Looks like we ran out of paint.

Painted eave

Another angle. Had to take advantage of the scaffolding!

Painted lintel

..and again!