The week ahead.

An update from our SS tells us that we are expecting plumbing connection tomorrow and frame delivery Wednesday which will hopefully start going up on Friday. Of course after the last week of beautiful weather, where our slab sat basking in the sun curing away, the week the work is set to start we have rain forecast. Fingers crossed we see the start of the frame this week. Please mother nature, be kind.

Some photos of the slab:

 I think the workmen were a little uncomfortable with my photo taking. 

                         Alfresco area which will be tiled. Nice view of the kitchen, laundry and bathroom plumbing
                                  

All done and ready for the frame

Consider this a lesson learned

Thought we would make the most of a sunny day at 8.30 this morning and decided to take a nice little walk around a newly laid slab, so we snuck on site, which was incredibly easy considering the side fence was left open. Armed with a tape measure we started to get a bit of an idea about what size all our rooms will be and the position of our kitchen.

Unfortunately our little man was more interested in the mud on the ground and ended up taking a tumble into a big pile of it. Stripped to nothing but a singlet it seemed like a good idea to wash his hands under the tap. Instead of turning it on my darling husband snapped it. OOPS!!! Needless to say we did the sensible thing and fled the scene of the crime.

2 calls to Sydney water and 7 hours later someone was on site fixing it. Have not been back to assess the final damage and not sure i want to. At my last check water was half way up the slab and slowly flooding the neighbours block. Do not even want to imagine what another 3 hours of a busted water main can do.

If by some crazy chance our neighbours are reading this i apologise immensely for filling your newly dug out block with water. I also recommend you complain to your builder about digging you into a giant hole, because honestly we do stupid crap like this all the time and I can not confidently say that we will not flood our house again at some point in the future. I do however promise that none of us will touch the construction tap again!!!

On a completely unrelated note. We recieved an invoice for our next progress payment and quite frankly it scared the socks off me. Although, after the initial shock of recieving such an epic bill wore off, the exictement kicked in. Money means progress. Bring on the frame!!

Best looking slab on the street.

I received a call at work at about 8am this morning, it was my husband calling to inform me that he was at the block and the workers were already there pouring the slab. After a short celebration it was back to work but the moment I finished, I was over there to see for myself, the progress that had been made. To say that I was delighted was an understatement. Also ran into our SS on site which was the first time we have actually met him. Seems like a nice enough guy but I guess only time will tell if he is any good at his job.

I looked around expecting that deflated "it's so small'' feeling but instead i was pleasantly surprised with the size of the slab and best of all our backyard did not look as small as what i was expecting. I mean it is still small, so small in fact, we could probably cut the grass with a pair of scissors in no time at all but I am now confident that we can at least squeeze in a clothes line.

We may be a little bias but it really is the best slab on the street. We have absolutely no dirt to remove, the land has been leveled almost completely to the fence line (just enough space left so we can retain the rear fence line before it collapses) which makes for easy landscaping (aka rolling out turf) and we sit above or in line with our neighbours, which means no nasty run off or flooding like our last house. So far so good. Keep this up One Three and we will be very happy house builders.

Slab will now cure for a week. Plumbers will come next Monday to connect pipes then frame is scheduled for Wednesday. Fingers crossed we don't lose another week to the rain. (photos to come as the computers card reader has decided to stop working)

Until then happy building!

Finally some progress.

So our block was scheduled to be cut the Tuesday before last but alas it rained and continued to do so for the entire week so it was rescheduled. So this Tuesday (5days ago) the rain was nowhere to be seen and the sun was shinning. We drove past in the afternoon to the very pleasing sight of a beautifully level patch of dirt. A call from our SS confirmed what we already new and yes construction has begun.

In the last 5 days we have been really happy with the progress. The levelling of the block is better than what we had expected (the slab of the neighbours house sits about a metre and a half off the ground and had us a little worried) The piering was completed and frame work for the slab was done on Thursday. On Friday our SS confirmed that the Waffle pods and rio had started going down and would be completed yesterday along with the SLAB POUR. It would need a week to cure and the frame was scheduled to arrive and start going up next Wednesday.

Well surprise surprise it rained again so the slab was not poured. The tradies we spoke to on site, said they would be back Wednesday providing it was not raining, so fingers crossed we see the finished slab this coming week.

                                          View from the front of the block before work began

                                                                        And another

                                                                 Digging to level the block

                                                                         Nice and flat

                                             The rear neighbour is much lower than us

                                                                    Piering complete       

                                                                           and again

                                                         Form work for the slab under way

Slab all ready for the pour hopefully in a few days time

Looking at the slab frame work all complete, the house looks tiny (which at 250m2 it isn't). As we did not end up going for a project home we have no idea how our house is going to look or feel, so we are really keen for the slab to be down just so we can walk on it and really start to get a feel for the house.