1 week on since handover

Wow what a crazy crazy week it has been, I only just realized it has actually been a whole week! so here's what has been happening:

The removalists came on Friday morning, and even though we had brought 8 car loads over the night before it still took 3 removalists plus Rick, Mum and I, four hours to move all our "big" stuff, what a mission!

As organized by SS the door/window people came and replaced the glass in the ensuite on Monday and added a screen door to the laundry that had been forgotten.

The deck guys started on Monday and have finished the front porch and are now almost finished the back, it looks awesome but I'm sorry I don't have photos yet!!! We will be doing the staining ourselves to save a few $'s.

The driveway guys are arriving at 6:45 tomorrow to clear the big mound of dirt out the back that has been there since site cut and also do all the form work for the driveway and spa slab and then pour on Saturday, YAY!! We ended up deciding to go with exposed agg after all, I/we just couldn't pick one colour to have the driveway.

Still waiting on the blinds to be delivered so we have sexy sheets up at the moment, I think the blinds are probably another week away and some even a bit longer than that as I received an email today advising they had run out and were expecting a shipment on the 17/08/12.

There was a mix up with our new bed, they realized the day before they delivered it that they had ordered the wrong colour, so instead have delivered our mattress and lent us an ensemble base until ours arrives in a couple of weeks. Doesn't bother us, but annoying for them given it had been sitting in their warehouse for 2 months while they waited for us to have handover.

The antenna guy is coming tomorrow too so we can get some t.v happening, not that we have had time for it anyway!

And it has been all systems go at our old house trying to get it ready to be rented out, ugh I hate going there! I just want to be here and unpack!! We have new carpet going in on Wednesday (we were hoping it might be salvageable with a clean, but no :-( lots of cleaning and painting, and a new external door, we have been there for 10 years so things had been let go a bit unfortunately, but it has prompted us to make a date in the calendar to have someone come and clean windows etc in our new house, I am even going to include it in the weekly budget, I don't like the thought of our beautiful new house being all dirty in a year or so.

We are absolutely loving our new home, it is so fantastic to finally be here! I cooked our first roast last night and the oven is awesome! we also finally made time to use the ensuite spa, it was very much needed after 6 days of moving and aching backs and feet etc. As far as the building side of it goes, we haven't found much that needs fixing that wasn't picked up at PCI . The only "problem" we have is that the hot water doesn't get hot enough and it takes ages to warm up, I'm talking half to 3/4 a bucket full of water before it gets warm. I know these continuous gas hot water things are supposed to be energy saving but it seems to counteract it if it is water wasting?? We asked our next door neighbours who said they don't have the same problem, I think theirs has 24 written on it and ours says 17* don't quote me on those numbers but there is a bit of a difference. Has anyone else experienced this issue?

Rick has been busy putting together a few things we had bought for the new house, being some bar stools, and an office desk, and  a cat "tree" for our boys. Rick also hung up all the pieces for our feature light, it looks amazing!!! my phone photo's really do not do it justice (it is too bright with it on) so you will have to wait until I get a chance to get the proper camera out....wherever that may be....

I'll be back soon with some driveway and deck photos :-)

Welcome home!

Surprise! We had handover a day early :-)

Post PCI

As the heading suggests we had PCI as scheduled on Friday, and I am pleased to say it went well!

Handover is confirmed, and will be on Friday the 10th around midday (someone else beat us to the morning handover slot!) but unfortunately no sooner as SS has 4 hand-overs next week. During PCI we mostly picked out painting that needs to be re-done or touched up, a little bit of grout missing on a tile in the pantry, the mark on the caesarstone kitchen bench doesn't appear to have buffed out, clean up of the mirrors in the powder room from the silicone edging that is smudged, a bedroom door that doesn't quite close properly (just needs re-adjusting), a couple of lights need re-fitting and one replaced, ummm that's about it really, so all in all pretty good! I haven't seen the QA report but saw something in the kitchen drawer that looks very much like QA so will have a good squiz next time SS isn't around. 

There are a few things that we would have thought would just be standard fixtures but apparently not, such as a nice finish between where the ensuite & bathroom floor meets the carpet it is a very crappy stained, marked, " brushed" aluminium but apparently all new homes are like that?? and same thing above the bi-fold door of the outside room, both are only minor and we can do them ourselves after hand over but they are really not things that I would have thought would need upgrading, I just kind of expected them like you do skirting boards etc I'll take a couple of pics so it makes more sense, but just odd that a lot of the other finishes are lovely and then these couple of things are downright awful! But if that is my only real whinge about quality at the completion then we are not doing too badly. 

I have the moving truck booked for late Friday afternoon, and our new bed being delivered on Saturday, and currently in discussion with the deck and driveway guys as to when we can get them in, power being turned on Thursday (in our name) so it is all systems go!

Thanks to everyone for your comments and feedback it has been great sharing this journey with you, especially my regular commenters' it has been lovely following your building blogs too! We still have a bit to go with the driveway, deck, blinds/curtains etc and one hell of a lot of landscaping, so I will continue to update on those as we progress as well :-)

I think the blinds will have their own post, what a freakin mission!!!!! I really never expected that out of the whole build that hardest thing would be the blinds and curtains. 

Will be back soon with some more pics, hope everyone has a good weekend.

10 more sleeps!!!!

It really is beginning to feel a lot like Christmas, and with just 10 days or less to go I think I can even start a countdown! Well the spa is in, the carpet is down, painters have been back to do a few touch ups (still more to go), temporary fence taken down, dirt spread around and umm I think that is about it, the only things remaining are the stove and dishwasher to go in (and the stinky port-a-loo to go). Spoke to SS this afternoon on-site who advised they are doing another clean tomorrow and then QA will happen later that day and then PCI on Friday, and then depending on PCI we will have hand over next week (scheduled for Friday) I cheekily asked if there is a possibility of it being sooner, he said it depends on PCI and what we need/want fixed. There really isn't much, most of it is painting, a few of the window sills need sanding and painting, there is a mark on the caesarstone that SS said should buff out, a number of lights need "fixing", the on and off are the wrong way around and you have to turn the hall light on before you can turn the bedroom ones on or it doesn't work lol. but other than that there really isn't anything left to fix :-D So now it is all the other stuff that goes with moving; driveway, electricity connection, house insurance etc. luckily I'm on night shift from Saturday onwards because I don't think I am going to be able to sleep all next week anyway lol

eeeeekkk it feels so real with carpet down!!

The front light on the left is broken/water logged at the bottom, it will be on the PCI list 

Balustrade on the balcony

study/office

looking fromt the master bedroom down the hall

Close up of carpet