We're half plastered

25/09/09: Well today was a massive surprise, I only expected the bottom storey bricks to be finished, which they were. The surprise being that all upstairs has been completely plastered. I knew that it was going to happen soon, but I thought that it would be happening next week.

It seems like a strange way to do it, upstairs plastering being completed before the bricks and before the downstairs plastering, but my SS told me that this is the way it's done. I'm extremely happy about this, but a little upset as well as I have just picked up some speaker cable to run through the walls in the upstairs TV room. I'm going up there tomorrow to do it, I don't think I'll be able to do it now. Oh well, I guess I'll only have to do the theatre room.

I can't wait to go up there tomorrow and walk around, it will feel like a real house.

I need to throw in another comparison to go with the one I posted two days ago regarding the Plantation blog I'm following. It took them 61 days to progress from the slab until the first bit of plaster, Coral have taken only 25 days. I'm not worried about this being a bad thing. Coral are taking the same amount of time as Plantation to do each individual process. It's just that Coral are doing one or two things at the same time whereas Plantation are taking around three days between each process.

I'm just a little worried that things will stop soon as my SS is away on holidays for one week as of today, I hope this won't hold things up too much.

Yet another day of bricking

24/09/09: Last night just before I went to bed I remembered that the electrician never asked me where I wanted to put the controllers for the Rinnai instant gas hot water system, I had a little freak out then thought the only thing I could do was call the electrician and see what he did.

Just before I left for work I called the electrician to ask what he had done, he told me he had only just realised yesterday that he had forgotten about them. He told me that he was doing the wiring for a house just over the road and he would pop over to do our wiring today, he asked me where I wanted them to be placed, I told him the spots to put them, he said it wasn't a problem and he would do it today. My fiancé didn't check if it was done today but she will look tomorrow, it seems like the problem was solved.

As for today’s work it was more bricks, looking at what was done over the past two day I'm guessing that they should finish the bottom storey tomorrow. Things will probably slow down early next week while they put the scaffolding up so they can continue the rest of the bricking. Hopefully the weather holds out, if it does I guess they could be finished the bricking at the end of next week. I hope so, fingers crossed.

Bricks have started & we have a spa bath

23/09/09: We weren't expecting much to be done today, with the dust storm and all. So we were over the moon to find out that they have started the brick work. When my fiancé went upstairs to have a look around she saw that we have a brand new spa bath, how exciting.

Things are going ahead so quickly, I've been following another two storey blog, the house is not being built by Coral but by Plantation Homes, it took them 52 days to get from the slab being poured until the bricking had started, it has taken Coral only 23 days to get to the same point.

Plumbing and gas pipes started

22/09/09: I rang the supervisor this morning about the placement of the gas point for our heater, he told me he would get the gas fitter to ring me when he was on site to arrange it. At around 11:00am I received the phone call, I told him we wanted it in the corner above or below the power point, he then told me that by law it needs to be 1m away from a walkway so no one can trip over the pipe, he said "I know it sounds stupid but that's the way it is." I told him that we are going to put my fiancé’s piano on that wall so it will need to be as close to the power point as possible, this is where he put it.

I know this was the best he could do but I think we will be about 20cm-30cm short to fit the piano in as it will cover the gas point, there is no moving a piano once it's in place.

The other things that were done today were the top storey windows which were put in place and the plumbing was done. It was a bit of a whirlwind visit for my fiancé as she had a meeting after work and could only stop by very quickly to check a few important things to make sure they were done, like the change of placement of the hosecock which I was very pleased to see was in the right place.

Enjoy today's pics, I can't wait to see what happens tomorrow.

Electrical wiring has been installed

21/09/09: I met the electrician on site this morning to run through the placement of power points, lights and light switches. Most of what I had done on the electrical plan was right, I only needed to move three power points and the placement of the TV point in the theatre room. I think we did pretty well with the layout, I hope so anyway.

There was only one question that I was stumped on for a while that I had to come back to. He asked me whether I wanted the light in the stair case on the wall or ceiling, I tried to ring my fiancé but I couldn't get hold of her, so I sent her an SMS. We moved on to the rest of the house then came back to the light, I hadn't heard back from my fiancé so I made the decision, I told the electrician to put it on the ceiling. Later that day I received the reply SMS from my fiancé telling me to put it on the ceiling. Thank God for that.

One other thing I spoke to the electrician about was networking the house, running the network cable from the study to the theatre room and also to the upstairs TV room. I almost fell over when he told me how much he charged, $100 per point. I can get the cable and face plates from work, I just don't think I have the time to install the cable myself before the plaster goes up, so I had to get him to do it.

Just before I left to go back to work I saw a guy doing some measuring, I asked him what he was measuring for, he told me it was for the bricks. When my fiancé turned up this afternoon to take photos, she saw that the bricks had been delivered, so I guess it’s not long now before they start. It's all go again for another busy week.

We now have windows on the bottom storey

18/09/09: I spoke to our site supervisor this morning to find out what was planned for today and next week. He told me that nothing was planned for today as he had allowed three days for the roof. He then told me that the electrician was going to meet me on site on Monday morning, this was the first I had heard of this.

I then had to get the electricians phone number so I could give him a call to find out what time to meet him so I could go to my boss to try and organise the morning off. Luckily I have the world's best boss and he has given me the morning off to meet the electrician on site.

I sent my fiancé a text message to let her know that nothing was planned for today and not to bother stopping by the house on her way home, luckily she didn't check her mobile before she left work, she went to the house and found that the windows on the bottom storey had been put in place.

We should be in for another busy week next week, we can't wait.

Kitchen colours and appliance choices

This is my final colour choices blog, it's our kitchen colours and appliances.


Wall Colour (Same as rest of house)

White Box Quarter (Dulux)




Floor Tiles (same as rest of house)

Il Monza Grigio (Amber Tiles)




Kitchen bench

Caesarstone Ice Snow




Kitchen Doors

Formica Refined Oak




Butlers pantry bench

Laminex Polar White




Splashback

MSR60 Mosaic Sheet




Taps

Caroma Acqua Mixers (used throughout the house)



Oven

Blanco BFS95FFF




Rangehood

Blanco BRCPB90X




Dishwasher

Blanco BFDWC65X




Microwave

Blanco BMO280X

Our roof tiles have been done

16/09/09: Today I got a chance to be the first one to see something new on the house, our roof tiles. I got to leave work early to go to my fiancé's work thing but stopped by the house on the way there. I was so surprised, the roof tiles had been done, the whole roof was completely tiled.

I can't believe that every day for the past two weeks something major has been done to the house, these guys are working so fast. I wonder what they have in store for the next two days, I can't wait to see.

When I walked in to look at the house I saw a pile of rubbish, it was all our broken tiles. It seems like such a waste, but I guess that means that any tiles that didn't look any good ended up here, so I suppose that's a good thing.

Fascia and gutters installed

15/09/09: Our fascia and gutters were installed today, ready for the roof tiles to go on this week.

While looking around and checking out our windows my fiancé noticed a piece of wood attached to the top of the garage going down to the slab on the house, it has some writing on it, I'll show you the picture first, if you click on it you can see a bigger image. Just in case you can't read it I have written it underneath the pic.

Do not remove garage will fall over

I'm not quite sure if this is a good thing that they have written this on there so people wont move it or if it's a bad thing because this is all that is holding up the garage. As long as the garage stays standing, it's all good.

Scaffolding is up & windows have been deilvered

14/09/09: Our scaffolding went up today. Things are on the move again, it should be another busy week of building. I have been told that they should be putting the gutter and fascia on upstairs tomorrow, then starting the roof upstairs on Wednesday it should be finished by Friday, we hope.

I also noticed that our windows have been delivered so I guess that they could be installed this week too, it should be a very exciting week again on the house front.