Painting by numbers? I think not....

His name might not be Van Gogh but who cares?! He is our painter and that's all that matters. Yes guys, the painter has arrived and has been working pretty hard by the looks of it. There's actually two of them, but we only met one as the other was too busy to disturb.And let's face it, if we stop him to have a chat then our walls or doors don't get painted and we wouldn't want that, would we? The painter who wasn't too busy spoke to us for a bit and said he'll be working on the house for another 4 to 5 days. I don't think one of those days would include Sunday, so I think he'll be at the house for the most part of next week. He said, and we saw, that the window sills and the architraves (that are finished) have been given their glossy coat and they look really good...so nice and shiny! I love the glossy wood! The ceilings have all been done. Not sure if it is only the bottom coat, or undercoat or whatever coat it is before the top coat but it is white and looks good too! I tell you what though, I could not believe the size of our store room! It is huge and we we both were really happy with that. All the shelving has just about been done in there, and our pantry and also linen cupboard have been shelved and I know we always complain about not having enough storage space, but I don't think that will be the case for us anymore.
Pete spoke to Michael yesterday and he said we are already at fixout stage, but we haven't received an invoice , nor is the spa (surprise surprise) in, so we think it might not be quite at that stage yet. Speaking of the spa, there are still issues with it and the guy who is in charge of Michael has been trying to call Pete and we think he'll try and get more money out of us because plumbing has to be changed in order to accommodate the change in spas. Mind you, it is not our fault they have had to be changed, therefor we don't feel that we should foot the bill..so stay tuned to see who wins that battle...(my money is on Pete)
So all in all a productive week workwise on the house. Not sure what happens next. I think it could be that the electricians get called back to bang holes in our newly painted walls and pull out wires that the plasterers covered up in order to put in our light switches and power points. Thank goodness I say for the green and blue texta marks all over the floor. Thank goodness also that the carpet and tiling haven't been done yet as that would probably have had to be ripped up in order to see those texta marks! There must be an easier way..but that would probably involve asking a woman hahaha

I've got a sinking feeling...!!

After being all excited about the fact we now had a garage door, I wandered around to the front of the house to see if I could peek through the any of the windows to see what had been happening during the week. Imagine my shock when I almost was buried alive in the muddy mess that this weeks rain had made of our block..yuckkk is all I can say. Hahahahaaaaa was all Pete could say as he watched me struggle to try and keep upright while my shoes disappeared at a fast pace beneath all that mud. Geeez, it looked pretty solid before I stood on it! Thank god I have lost all that weight, otherwise I'd probably be in China by now..it was that deep! truly...And what was my darling husband doing while I was sinking? Taking a video and photos of me and laughing his head off! I couldn't get too mad at him though because he has been suffering terribly all week..(and still is) (which means I am too) with a nasty abscess and tooth pain.and tooth extraction, a filling,and lack of sleep..should I go on? (war and peace would be shorter!!)
Anyway, as you can see they installed our garage door and we think it looks great. Only bad thing was they also put the proper back door to the garage on as well, so we couldn't break in (I mean enter). The front doors have also been hung and look good, apart from the colour as these have to be painted black.
So all we could do was walk around the outside of the house (avoiding any more mud) and just look through windows to see if anything new was done.
We could see the kitchen benches had been finished, except the silestone top, and they look really good. Also it seems the shelving in the pantry has been done. Nothing as yet in our walk in robes, and we also couldnt see into the other bedroom wardrobes as all those doors have been hung and were closed. Not that I'm sure at what stage the wardrobes get their hanging things, but shouldn't be too far away. All the architraves have been done and the only bit of plastering that looks like it needs to be done is in the kitchen above the pantry and the oven.
I got a call on Friday from the guy who will be doing our concreting, so we will head off to the warehouse and pick our colour next weekend. The stamping pattern they are doing is called Brindabella and I love it as it has a slate look to it. That will be done all up to the garage and front door and a bit to the side of the garage. Also we are getting a path from the laundry door to the clothesline out the back. So it should look great!
We have been told fixout stage will be the 25th of May and 3 weeks after that roughly is our walk through inspection and then 2 weeks after that it's the handover. That is a very rough estimate at the moment, but going by that it could be about 6 weeks till we are in!!! I am not getting my hopes up..but it's good to think positively, and by then my shoes should have dried out and Pete might have stopped laughing!!!!!

Is It Really Classed as Breaking and Entering?

If we aren't the ones who broke in, but we did enter??? That is the question to ponder about this week. Let me start from the beginning. Pete and I arrived at the house and first thing we noticed is that we have 3 piles of dirt dumped at the back of the house. That is a good thing as one of our neighbours had arranged for this to be done as way of a thank you for the bricks he got from us. I noticed that the garage internal door has now been fitted but there was no handle and just a screw screwed in to prevent (yeah right) any attempts to enter the house.This was a bummer for my chief photographer as it meant he had to be happy (which he wasn't) with taking pictures of the inside, from the outside..and all that sunglare and my reflection as I was sticky nosing inside just did not help. So after a bit of sulking and a few photos we went down to our neighbours to thank him for the dirt. A few cars drove past us heading towards our house and they parked outside. Imagine my surprise when they all got out and started opening the security fence and were heading towards our house! I walked back and yelled out "Hi..this is my house" and one of the women said she thought it might be and that she was working for Dennis Homes and wanted to show prospective clients around our house. I thought this was a bit cheeky, and the thought of people walking around inside our house without us there was a bit annoying, but technically it isn't our house till handover. So anyway, she produced keys and thought they'd be able to open the front door, which they didn't, so she then produced a screwdriver and removed the screw in the garage door. This cheered up chief photographer to no end as he now had clear run of the inside of the house!! I think he actually skipped inside with a big grin!! Anyway, we have a kitchen! Most of the cupboards have been installed and we are really happy with the colour and particularly the handles, and think they look great (so did our fellow breaker-inners (doubt if that is even a word, but who cares..hehe) Most of the doors have been hung and we are very pleased we got the type we did. And our bathroom and ensuite and powder room cupboards and benchtops have been done and we LOVE the colour we chose for that. It looks great against the soft grey doors and the black handles once again, very nice. Still nothing to do with the spa has been done, ie, the boxing in or whatever it's called, but all in good time. Just the size of the ensuite is great, and actually we just are really happy with the size of all the rooms. Now the kitchen cupboards are in you can see the spot that is meant for the fridge and I thought it was too small and also the cavity for the double oven didn't look large enough. Thankfully the guy who came in had a tape measure and he measured it up and I've checked and everything's good. Oh and only being able to look in through windows is not always good. I was looking in the laundry and that sink and cupboard has been installed and I notice the hole for the pipe that comes from the washing machine was on the right hand side which means I'd have to stretch it over the whole sink to fit into the hole. I thought this was a bit weird and thought maybe we needed a left hand cupboard and not a right hand one (if there are such things), so we made a mental note to add it to our list to discuss with Dennis Homes next time we talked to them. Once we actually got inside, I checked it out and there is a removable piece so you can use either side..problem fixed! easy. I think our only main concern is the internal door from the garage. It definately is not straight and will have to be fixed, it needs to come down a bit on the left, not sure if that is such an easy fix, but it will have to be done. You know how when you know something isn't quite right, it bugs you, and even though others might not notice..well, we do, and so near enough isn't good enough.

No update this week, however.....

As I was getting very spoiled and having Smeg appliances in my new kitchen, I thought I'd find some pictures of them and show you. I also found colour samples of our kitchen bench top and our cupboard door colour, cupboard door handles, internal door handles, the main bath and even a picture of that elusive spa! There's also a picture of our front door (imagine it painted black) and one of the internal doors. Oh and there's also a sample of our carpet.
As I said, no update as there didn't seem to be much done this week except the plastering is just about finished and all the internal doors have been delivered. Not sure if they are already painted or still have to be painted and whether they get hung first (although surely even doors deserve a fair trial! haha)