There's ploughman's lunches:
And very soon we'll have a marmoleum floor and a hob and a rangehood and a sink that works and a dishwasher and the kitchen will be done. Soon.
There's ploughman's lunches:
Drainage works are complete and Mish zoomed out today to plant her magnolia. This is bashing in stakes to keep it stable while it settles in, as seen from the bath.
The next two days will be hectic with trades in and outside the house, but that will pretty much wrap up the electrical, building, and plumbing work. Yay! The floor works will be a bit longer as the marmoleum layer in the kitchen and the timber sander are held up.
Mish delighted with her kitchen cabinetry and here comes the 5mt stainless steel benchtop:
Taking in the morning sun and spring odourama on the deck outside main bedroom and studio. So glad we put that back in the works.
Bit by bit, things are wrapping up and the pieces of the house are going into place.
A few weeks ago we had an empty kitchen.
Still to come in the kitchen: flooring, blinds, lighting, stainless steel bench top (coming in the door in one veeeery long L-shaped piece in about two weeks), induction hob (seen above in cardboard box that was quietly chewed by Plum under the bed one day), and fridge (it's down the hall).
Other bits getting ticked off include building the deck outside Mish's studio. Decking arriving:
The piles of topsoil and sand have come out of the soakpit we had to dig for drainage in the middle of the photo. We can plant over that, it's like a Lego system of plastic crates and matting underground. Just don't drive on it haha.
The first of our tradies have left the site. Momentous!
The painters finished yesterday and we lifted up the thin plywood sheets laid down over the floors to protect the surface from painters, plasterers, etc. Then we swept up, picked up, vacuumed, and hired a carpet washer and gave the guest bedroom a good clean. It's beginning to look and feel like a house again instead of a worksite.
Which is rather nice cause both of us are down with a rotten cold that's making us cough our guts out. I've had it nearly two weeks and I shared with Mish a week ago. We've never been sick at the same time. No energy. Most inconvenient.
This time to sister Arlene's small farm to look after their new pooch Bo, another huntaway, while she and kids spent a sporty week in Queenstown.
At this stage of our build we are so loving peaceful places to just hang out. So nice to have electricity at night - and an actual kitchen!
An Australian with gum trees in the back paddock.
New Plymouth, yay!
A four hour road trip up north - we ran away for three days. It was getting fairly stressful, living in the works with tradies everywhere coming and going and trying to stay out of their way and dust and power cords all over the floor and so on.
Pukekura Park was far more peaceful.
Had a lazy few days, walking around favourite places in the city and beyond.
Monica's Cafe, always good.
Stopped halfway home at the cleanest cafe in the world, the funky fifties Viv's Kitchen with cheap and chokka toasted sandwiches.
With superb timing, my old mate Diana who lives around the corner from us and her partner Robynne have gone south for two weeks. And we are camped at their place. Wahoo!
The builders and all the other trades are now in every room of the old house except the living room and we can't yet get into the new wing. Living room is stacked with boxes and furniture and the electricity is off. But we have a haven.
Ripping off the gib in the writing room.
And looking in the other direction back into the house through what was our two adjacent bathrooms.
Tim's standing in what was the little loo - knocked out so we can now walk through to the new wing.
Just walked around to the house to get a couple of things and for Mish to ask and answer a few questions (a daily occurrence). We're days away from being able to move into the new part. Overnight we've had the most rain we've had this year - we haven't lost a day of the build to rain.
That's nice, because yesterday we planted a persimmon tree. Mum grew this from a seed over ten years ago and it's been in a pot since then. She passed it to Mish about five years ago and we'll grow it for leaf colour just outside her new studio. Root system is good, leaves are about to break and it's going yay rain right now.
The winning team in a hockey quiz night fundraiser!
That's Fiona who I used to work with on the right, her husband Matt, nephew David and his partner, Shani, and us. An ideal combo of ages and knowledge, and a fab sign.
Starting position, on your blocks. Tim's about to rip out the first frame in the living room.
First one gone.
Then, for a few days we had a big plywood box for a living room. Quirky and a bit cool - mid winter.
Our busiest day yet on site. Sixteen people with tools and radio. Two extra builders today and they are working on windows and doors. The biggest windows are frames only due to the weight of them and the glazier will fix that later this week. In the meantime we'll be kept in the dark with plywood over the big holes in the walls.
This image encapsulates the action today: rain, front door out, living room doors out, bedroom window about to come out.
More painting, plastering, and tiling. These guys have to finish their work in the new build this week so the floor dudes can come in and do their stuff.
Our meticulous tiler working around the bath.
Mish in the shower area beside another mirror that isn't there yet. This one will have a special feature invented by us - come and see it!
Another very busy day on the site. Mish will need a wee glass of merlot come five o'clock when the yard clears.
This morning: two builders, four plasterers sanding, three unexpected painters, two tilers in the bathroom, and one plumber arriving any moment to hopefully fix the bore which has stopped working again.
Last week, Mish up the scaffold experimenting with soffit colours (very similar shades of grey).
Over the weekend we wandered through the new build to finalise paint colours. The painter has quoted for three colours so he is now requoting haha. We have eight colours, with splashes of bright colour here and there, and a metallic bedroom ceiling that will be tricky to apply. Doable, but tricky. It's only money.
In the bathroom area, perhaps a splash of colour to match the gold highlights in a small run of tiles? The panel behind Mish's head is now orange. Yeah!
7am this morning, we threw a bacon and egg roll breakfast for our builders and we all watched the 2024 UEFA final. Spain 2 England 1.
Meanwhile, the cheery plasterers arrived for their first visit, and they just started work. On stilts!