I guess we didn't really consider the downside to living in an old riverbed until we tried to dig to find solid ground for the garage wall.
Two metres down, the excavator conceded defeat for the day. When our next door neighbours arrived home, it was to discover our shared side fence down and a trench right alongside their usual car parking point/s. They also informed us that when the graders came to dig out for the asphalt on the road (the neighbours have been here for centuries, I think...), the huge machines were up to their roofs in the pit they were digging to find foundations. Gee. Great. Yeah, we have no hope!
We've had two mini landslides overnight - not helped by destructive yabbies doing their.... yabbying.... - and now we're urgently trying to locate a fire rated replacement boundary wall material, other than the brick we were counting on. Any suggestions?
See all that junk up on the deck? That'd be the contents of my laundry. And some furniture we can't fit anywhere else in the 2.5 rooms we are living in.On to the good stuff! In that same picture (above) you can see the wall we are going to take down (the one with the glass windows above and the one next to that) - we're not replacing the diagonal part, this will be a wide step down onto the deck Steve and I are going to build between the existing one you see and the point where I stood to take the photo. It's going to create a bit of a courtyard behind the garage and a room where I plan to eventually start consulting (IF WE EVER BUILD IT NOW!). And the rest of it (to the left) we are replacing with some sort of horizontal timber screening.
The temporary fence for the dogs, now that the excavator has taken what was left of the driveway and old garage slab.I made Steve's week when I told him he should take the spare room and turn it into a games (read: boy) room. I draw the line, though, at permanently closed curtains at the window. So he must compromise.
There is enough room in here, now we've widened it a good .5m, for a couch and we've decided not to put cupboard doors in until we need it to be a cupboard (below) - which gives perfect hanging space for a TV.
Here is the LGBB's room, ready to go.... just as soon as we put on the architraves, cornices, paint it and do the floor. I designed a wide cupboard and an open bookshelf (with space for a small built-in desk) to the right of that, in the foreground there. We'll get some wardrobe internal configuration from a place I found down the road here. Systems are still "GO" here for an apple green and white room, as per the LGBB's request.
Just a little reminder to myself about the lovely view so I don't get too despondent amidst the never-ending dirt, mess, plaster dust, crumbling foundations....:
I'm so looking forward to sitting in this room when it's finished. Early morning sun streaming in the windows, kissing the tops of the trees with the mist rising off them. Ahhh!
When I asked the builder for a cut-out (the back is not on it yet) at the end of the 'hallway' to create a bit of a focal point for some art, I didn't expect him to give me an interim visual - "The Coffee Cup", by esteemed artist Ronald "Ranga" McDonald.
The shower in the middle of being waterproofed. We're having floor to ceiling tiles in here, the floor space is a nice, roomy 1200x900 (our current shower floor is just 800x800mm - ie. crammmmped! - so we'll probably end up using the new one til our ensuite is done, on the 12th of Never, when we have the funds, going by the way we're throwing away money like no one's business right now). I'm hoping to find a nice earthy toned, large tile for the walls and floor. We have chosen chrome fittings and a round-sided bath set in to a hob so there's plenty of space for toys, candles, soaps, etc.
And the down side to locking the dogs inside overnight now that they can't sleep where they usually do up on the deck (because we no longer have a side fence or gates)? Our old lady, Pep, just cannot hold her water for that long anymore. She pissed on the floor, right in the hallway, poor darlin' :( I can only imagine her horror and shame (she has NEVER disgraced herself inside, ever, in all the years we've owned her). And it stopped only about a centimeter from one of our last remaining whole plaster sheets which we really need!
