We're now expecting to see renderers & plasterers on site to attend to both inside and out, air con ducting installed to the upper floor, ceiling and cornices installed and windows put in as the next steps. Basically they get the upper floor to "lock up". Fingers crossed we get a good run of these trades in November!
It seems everything happened while we were away (as is always the case when you're watching something closely).
As part of the celebration of Cheryl, 11x Wylde's went south for a week down at Siesta Park, just outside of Busselton during the first week of school holidays for some well needed R&R. Back home at our build, things weren't quite so leisurely. Fortunately my neighbours are keeping us updated and half way through our trip down south, on Wed 27th September, I received a couple of messages to say that our roof cover was going on.
Top Roof Cover is another project milestone, which of course means another bill, but also means another step closer. Our next major milestone is Lock Up, so there's going to be a fair bit happening to get to that stage. Naturally, I took the opportunity to fly the drone over the house to capture the roof cover in all its glory.
Also, randomly after flying the drone over, I noticed a few days later we now have a TV aerial. I don't know when that happened!
On Friday 1 September it was all action at our block with the arrival of our roof carpenter together with a crane. The crane spent a few hours lifting all the roof materials up into the upper floor and onto the scaffolding and the boys wasted no time cracking in. By the end of the day, we had the start of all the flat beams that the ceiling will attach to. We could also see where the raised ceiling recess will be for our master bedroom.
Speaking with the tradies, they thought they had a day or two ahead of them still so hopefully the weather stays good and we see them first up next week.
During brickwork for the upper floor, the scaffold is built at the same height as the upper floor slab. In order to progress with roof works, it's required to be elevated further to a few courses below the top of the upper floor brickwork.
We've been waiting for this to happen since achieving plate height so it's good to see them there today doing their thing. Our last fortnightly update suggested the roof materials would follow pretty quickly after the scaff lift and the roof carpenter following after the materials so with some beautiful weather forecast for the next week, we have everything crossed we might see the construction of the roof commence soon.
It's been a little over three weeks since my last update and I'm happy to report that we have today reached plate height for our upper floor. Adam has been on site practically every business day barring a couple, diligently working away despite the pretty ordinary weather we've had over the last few weeks. His dad helped out a bit in the first week with the external walls but it's been Adam flying solo since then.
The weekend just gone gave us our first look at all our rooms with most internal walls largely complete, barring a few courses on the wall to our robe, a small nib wall to our void and a wall required to hide some air con ducting (by school drop off this morning, all of those were complete!). Amanda and I spent a little bit of time walking around each room and couldn't be happier with their sizes and the design choices we made.
Probably the only thing I'd change, if I had my time again would be the robes in the kids bedrooms. They are a good width (Imogen's particularly at just over 3m!!) but their depth is a bit awkward at just shy of a metre. They are too deep for non-walk-in style robes but not quite deep enough to make them proper walk in's. I have no doubt a robe company will be able to do some smart designs with their configuration to make them work, but seeing them in person, they were the only thing that made me question our design.
There was a little bit of brick work still to be done on the balcony at this stage but other than that, we're now done with the brickwork for the upper floor. We're hoping that this week's update brings news of our upper floor roof commencement in the near future. We can but hope!
After yet another wait for labour, we had our first sign of actual construction related movement on the block yesterday. We were meant to get a brickie team a few weeks back but apparently Stannard lost a team to another builder, which threw a spanner in to their scheduling works. Yesterday's update from Sam, our construction coordinator, however, was a little more positive, stating we should expect to see a brick layer on site this week for preparation with construction to commence next week.
True to her word, today Amanda drove past our block and found Adam, a bricklayer assigned to our upper floor, on site. Adam is a solo bricklayer, supported by his Dad, and built another Stannard home one suburb over, so we're familiar with his work. Also, Dean, our design consultant spoke highly of Adam prior to our build commencing, so we know he's a bit of a gun bricklayer and that we're going to get a quality product from him.
Adam got a lot of things prepared during the afternoon, marking out where all the external and internal walls needed to go and getting materials ready for a start in the coming days. He even put up a few things like placing some of our void windows. Hopefully the weather holds out, although there is rain forecast, as we're very much feeling overdue to see some actual construction on our house! Stay tuned.
The upper floor will bring our three main bedrooms, our master ensuite and robe, the kids bathroom, our sitting room, a study nook and it balcony. Hopefully we get some good news about the brick layers soon.
15/6: We had some door frames delivered today :)
