Tiles completed

The grout has been finished off in the wet areas and it's already made a huge difference to the outlook. I'm overwhelmed with excitement now and can't wait to see them clean...my kind of CLEAN that is!

My lovely square drop in grate

Tile update #2

These tilers have done an amazing job so far. Tomorrow should see them finish off and we couldn't be happier with it all.

Ensuite bath

Tile update

The tilers started the wall tiles in both bathrooms, and the skirting tiles in the WC. 

Hopefully they get to finish these off and start on the laundry and powder room today, leaving tomorrow to complete the job. 

SS said that the kitchen and bathroom bench tops will go in this week as well...woo hoo, but won't have the painters start until the tilers are finished.

He also said that we should get the keys on the 12th Dec...then it's onto organising the tiler to come and lay the internal tiles and then the carpet can be laid after that. 

It looks as though we'll be having Christmas in our new home after all yippee!

Main bathroom shower

Straight Lines

We went up to the house yesterday after baseball, and noticed that the tilers had laid the tiles (floor) in all the wet areas.

My goodness, I couldn't believe the great job I saw before me, the lines were soooooo straight, and I guess it helped having the drop-in grate because there were no cuts in the tiles...yay!

Now I've seen many tiles being laid before, but these guys have done an exceptional job and we couldn't be happier.
I just can't wait to see the walls done come tomorrow or Tuesday, they're gunna look awesome.

Even though the tiles are charcoal in colour, they give off a brownish hue which is exactly what we wanted to tie all the colour scheme in together.

We also noticed that the downpipes were put on and the sanding had been done on the walls in readiness for the painters....woo hoo I'm beside myself.

Ensuite tiling 

It's electrifying!

We had the electrical fit out (or what ever you call it) done yesterday and the tilers started preparing the wet area floors today.

Apparently they'll be back tomorrow according to our SS, to start laying the tiles. I can't wait to see them, I've been so worried that they maybe be too dark and I perhaps should've went with a lighter colour or even white for the walls.

Oh well time will tell and I can make my mind up when I see them finished. I suppose I could just break it all up by adding some different coloured accessories when we're in!

The hub of the house... the kitchen

I had to see our neighbour this afternoon and whilst I was there, I noticed the kitchen guy was still at the house.
Yippee I thought so I went in to have a look while I waited for my neighbour to get home.

He was just finishing off putting the handles on the ensuite cupboards when I asked if I could take a look at my kitchen.....OMG... (I'll say that again), OMG it looks amazing.

I was so chuffed at the colour I almost cried. He had installed everything by himself and looked absolutely buggered. Now I can't wait to see what it'll look like with the stone tops and splash back.

I managed to get a few pics but they don't do it justice so bare that in mind when you see them. Just like me, you have to visualise them without the wrapping, clean and completed.

Wet area

All wet areas are now completed and are ready for the tiler....yippee, I'm ever so looking forward to seeing my 'Alpes black'  polished porcelain tiles they're gunna look awesome with the new Cavia Lini doors I just know it!

Main Bathroom

main WC

Laundry

Powder Room

Ensuite

Ensuite

Ensuite

doors

All internal doors are on now and the architraves and skirting have been completed

I never thought I could get so excited to see doors (especially my awesome LIN 1 doors), well worth the extra cost and much more classier than what we first went with (same internal doors as others).

Now the reality of us getting closer to the end is finally sinking in!

cavity sliding Lin1 doors

Locked up...locked out, and bush fires!

Soooooo upsetting seeing our house all closed up and no-one there to talk to her, yet very happy at the same time. Yes I know, I said talk to her, I often go in to see how she's coming along and often commenting on how beautiful she looks...don't you?

 I'm rolling around with laughter on the floor right now... can you see me? And you thought I was serious lol.

It's coming together nicely and I'm soooooooo impressed by it all. We have had the best supervisor you could ask for. Thank you so much Brian for everything you have done to get our build to this stage.

Now that was this morning....when we went back this afternoon to have our concreter re-measure for all the concreting we want done after handover, the picture below shows how ferocious the fires were getting.

I've never seen the sky not only change so quick, but so eery at the same time. I had been working at home and listening to the weather report that was being announced just before I picked up the kids from school and it wasn't until I got outside and looked at the sky. The fires had been at Springwood and Winmalee all day and have now gotten out of control. OMG it was like I was in the eye of a storm or something. On my way to school, the sky went from a greenish colour to almost black. Now I'm talking a matter of seconds from the time I drove out of the driveway and down the street and up to the school. I started to panic and hoped it wasn't going to come too close.

We had to meet our concreter at 4.30pm and when we got there I noticed our front door was now on....lock up. After spending about half an hour with him, my eyes started to water, I started to cough and wanted to get back into the car. It had been blowing a gail and I thought I was hiding enough so it wouldn't play up with my sinus's but I guess it still got me. After we finished with Mitchell our concreter from Ducky's Concreting Pitt Town (plug), I was amazed at how quick the sky had changed. The smoke was now, not only surrounding us, but looking quite brutal  in the direction of home. All I wanted to do was get back and stay indoors.

Our house that we are currently renting is only a 3 minute drive from the new house, the following pictures tell the story of how fast the smoke was approaching.

this is what it looked like before I got into the car. I'm facing the direction of our rental which is in the direction of Springwood. Our new house is on the right just out of the picture but 3 blocks away from the one above. It was hard to know which direction the smoke was coming from as the winds were so strong. Were they coming from Springwood, or perhaps they were coming from Winmalee which is to the right of me 

this was on our way home. I got Geoff to stop so I could take a photo of how it was clearing (to the right) and surrounding us above our heads

I'm now standing in our backyard, yeah I know I said I wanted to stay indoors but I couldn't smell any smoke it was weird. By this time the wind had died down anyway and who could resist taking a snapshot of this

Looks like I'm looking at the eye of a storm, see the small circle just on the left of the shot?

I thought it was bad enough looking ahead of me, but this is directly above me now, it looks as though I could reach up and touch it. I haven't even zoomed in...yikes. And still there is no smell of smoke, it was bizarre!

Now this freaked me out, it's about half an hour after we got home and it looks as though the fire is right behind the smoke. It's actually the sun!

After the kids yelling at me to come out the front, this is what I was faced with. It's now been 35 mins from the first photo and already you can see how much it went from just a little bit of a yellow cloud to now a full on blackish purple stormy looking sky and it's in the direction of the new house. Looking down on the ground, we had black ash all over our driveway and on the lawn...I won't tell you what our car looked like!

Is that scary or what? This shot was taken no more than 3 mins from the one above. Now all I want to do is go back to the house and make sure it's ok

This is the golf course that's half way to the new house. I'm looking in the direction of Winmalee now which is NW

Whilst I was taking photos, Jordan said I think there's a fire down there. Pointing to a small smoke stack just to the left of the pic and in between the 2 trees to the left (if you magnify the picture you can see it).

here it is after zooming in 200mm. Could it have been an ember that came from the fire at Winmalee?

After checking that the house was ok and it was...phew, we drove a little further to the other part of the estate 'Bona Vista & Riverside'

This is where the 1/2 acre lots are in Vermont

See this picture? Go back to where I said that perhaps an ember started a small fire. Now look at the road...does that tell you what happened?

The stupid idiot was doing burnouts on the back road of the turf farms just down from the estate.

What a loser! I couldn't believe what we were witnessing, as if the poor bloody firemen had nothing better to do than to put this D'head's car out. I hope they put him on the front line of the bush fires and see how he copes with what they have to do. My heart goes out to all the people who have lost everything and hope all those poor firemen fighting the blaze get some relief soon. Look at the sky now  it's clearing in the Springwood direction

this is looking back through to Vermont 10 mins later, it's now clearing on the horizon but the smoke is coming from the Winmalee direction

Comments:

R. Roberts - Great photos Michelle. Its very eerie isn't it! And what an idiot to be doing burnouts near the bush when there are fires about. I don't understand how stupid people can be sometimes. 

Me - I know...I hope he now realises what a tosser he was and what he could've potentially caused 

The cornices & water proofing

The cornices were installed and completed yesterday and they started the water proofing in the wet areas today

Come on in and take a look!

entry

Gob-Smacking

After having my hair done (mummy pampering day) today, I decided since I was only around the corner to call into the MJH display homes in Kellyville Ridge just for fun. We used to live (recently sold) just down from there but never viewed the homes.

I was gob-smacked to say the least when I walked into one of them and found our new kitchen colour Cavia Lini in the bathroom...what! then as I walked into the kitchen I couldn't believe what I was seeing...it was the old colour and it had the same splash back.

Well I'm sure they were the same as picked because they looked just like the samples Erin had given me. I wish I had the samples on me to compare but I took photos so I could see against the samples when I got home. Let's see what you think

This is the old door colour choice: Crystalgloss Crystal Anthracite for both kitchen and bathrooms and the splash back which we still have is Resene Grey Blast 1(upgrade) which is a charcoal colour and gives a shimmery effect 

Almost at lock up

We had our garage doors installed today and they look amazing, and all the internal doors have been delivered, we're almost at lock up now.

Lights...

Thanks to http://www.lights2you.com.au we now have our kitchen pendants and theatre wall lights...applause!

This is what they'll look like

this is our pendants x 3 in black bamboo

5 x wall lights for theatre

Outdoor Lights

We bought 8x marine grade up/down outdoor lights from here so that Sam can install when he comes back to do the electrical fit-out

The walls

They finished the walls today and the plastering will be done on the 9th October. a massive job well done guys!

We had our battens put on the pavilion as well....OMG is all I can say! Simply Sunning and it's not even finished.

The house is taken on some real beauty now, and if it looks this good unfinished....then you can only imagine how it'll look when it's completed!

Gyprock day 1

They started the gyprock installation today starting with the ceilings