Wednesday 9 December 2009

We have fire!!

Returned from holiday in the hope that our lovely peice of slate would be delivered for the hearth and everything ready to go for the stove installation today. No such luck!

Arrived back and the hearth still hadn't been delivered AAARGH. A few hours later it finally turned up (2 days late) and we took it home ready to lay only to find .... the inside bit was too big!!! Miles too big, it obviously wasn't checked at all.

We called the fireplace guy who advised us if he didn't install today it would be after Jan. grrrrrr Our only option was to cut the slate ourselves. Reza did an ace job and in the end it wasn't too much of a problem but it wasn't what we needed the evening we got back from our relaxing holiday!

Stove has now been installed as is burning away as I type. I have managed to set the smoke alarms off a few times ... whooops. I was told it will smoke for a bit until all the paint fumes etc burn off. Here's the pics. We do everything backwards and the whole room is totally un-decorated so there's lots more to come.



Thursday 3 December 2009

Windows finished and new front door

YEY! We definitely need to get the house painted now!





Wednesday 2 December 2009

Fireplace

I realised I haven't posted any pics of our fireplace progress so here they are. Next week we get our slate delivered and wood burning stove installed which will finish it off.









Lovely new windows :)

Not much to say but lots of pics ..... We've had new windows in the back of the house today to finish everything off. Our new front door is being fitted tomorrow.

I'm so pleased :)










Monday 30 November 2009

How many people does it take to hang a door?!

It felt like a really busy weekend!

Saturday, Reza was working all day so I had a mass clear up (although strangely it didn't look a lot different) and also tidied up the garden. The main point being that the window people are coming this week and won't be able to access the lounge window with all that rubbish in the way!! I did also clear the leaves from the lawn and swept up etc. Was quite pleased with myself :) Also glad I did it on Sat as it poured the next day!

Sunday ended up being a quite random day. We went to the cafe for breakfast with friends and one said they were going to B&Q so I thought it would be a good opportunity for me to buy the doors we need for upstairs and put them in his van. I got 3 lovely Oak (not solid!) doors for a bargain price. Reza wasn't keen at first but I think he's warmed to them. The boys then spend the whole afternoon fitting the bathroom door. Wow .... I just didn't realised how long it takes and how much goes into it. I'm so happy now ... it looks fab! Just need to stain the door and paint the frame. Only 2 more to fit but I think we'll get a professional in for those ;)





The best bit by far of my weekend was the fact I finally had a bath in the new bathroom!!! woop woooooop. It was so nice :) It still needs to be sealed round the edges etc but we'll do that this week and then use it again towards the weekend. Reza also had a shower in the new wet room bit. I think we're probably going to need a half screen along one side as the water travels to the basin and our guests will get wet feet if someone's had a shower!! We'll work on that but it's fine for now. Here's the cool taps ... (been waiting aaaaaaaaaages to get a pic of these!)



oooh oooooh I remembered something else. We got a new cooker for free!! Just a reminder that our current cooker is like something from the war so anything post 1950's would be an improvement! We need to get the gas guy round to install but can't wait to use it and it'll match our new kitchen :)

Sunday 22 November 2009

Operation 'Move the Loo' .... Complete :)

oooooh lots of new this weekend :)

It was the weekend we moved the toilet (well, soil stack) from the downstairs toilet to the new one upstairs. Chemical loo ready while the toilet was out of action and we were ready to go :)

We removed the old toilet (Yipeee it was yuck) and had to dig down to find the sewage pipe. I don't really know the details but Reza and Pete said it was a lot less stress than they thought. The pipe wasn't far down (we suspect as it wasn't the original one) and wasn't encased in concrete. Result!







Within a few hours they'd put in the new soil stack then in another few hours we had a working toilet upstairs. Who hoooo!



We've almost finished fitting the bath now so I think by mid-week I will be able to have a relax in my new bath aaaaaah :)

Oh ... only thing, there's no door on the bathroom yet!!

Other good news is that the double glazing woman came round this weekend. We knew the deal this time where they give you one price then a much better one if you can get them done asap etc etc. We knew this so didn't book her to come until we were ready and thought it might be cheaper over Xmas :) We were right! We're really pleased with the quote and are going to have french doors in the lounge instead of a window, a new back door, kitchen window, the two bedroom windows and a new posh front door. Even better, they're installing in two weeks time YEY I'm really happy :)

Lots happening before Xmas now, bathroom, windows, fireplace. woop woop

Tuesday 3 November 2009

Tiling finished!! :)

Great news .... at last after 2 months the tiling in the bathroom is finished WHO HOOOO!!

My Dad has worked so hard on it and it looks great.

Here's some piccies...







Now we've got until Christmas to put all the fittings in and the plumbing etc. Think it might take that long!

Other news is that we decided to bring getting our wood burning stove forward for Christmas so Reza started to knock out the fireplace. Looks quite big now (it's not really ...) Got the chimney guy coming in a couple of weeks to put a new pot on and take the lining out to test. Exciting!!

Monday 19 October 2009

Almost finished ...... :)

Not too much to update but we've (mainly Dad) been working non stop on the bathroom tiling for 6 weeks now. We almost finished this weekend but the bit round the window has lots of cuts and is pretty tricky. We also need just a few more tiles to finish. Hopefully a finish this weekend then another weekend (maybe more) of grouting. Not sure how long all the plumbing is going to take but I think we'll aim for Christmas now.






A reminder of how the room looked when we first viewed the house ....... wow!



Other good news is we have heating upstairs who hooooooo!! It was all plumbed in a while ago but we hadn't got round to draining the radiators etc so I gave Reza an ultamatum he HAD to get it sorted this weekend. He did :)

We're really stuck what to do downstairs as we were going to wait for the bathroom to be done then knock the old one down and create my office. All hopefully before it got cold but it's cold now and it's not done. Debating installing a stove in the lounge as we were going to get one anyway and then we could work on the heating when the time came. We can't make any decisions until the bathroom is finished. It would be nice for Xmas though :)

Monday 5 October 2009

More tiling and Stevo's bedroom

Autumn is almost here now and thinking back it seems like we've been pretty lucky with the weather this summer. We couldn't of moved in in a better month (May) as we've practically had the whole summer and still have good weather to get things done. Makes a big difference as we can't spend much time in the house with everything going on.

I finally took all the flowers out this weekend and now the garden looks pretty bare :( There's a few tomatoes left but nothing else booooooooo! Got great plans for the garden next year so looking forward to that. In the meantime, I need to plant the bulbs I bought in the next couple of weeks.

The tiling is coming along really well. Thank god the walls are so much quicker than the floor. Dad is speeding through!! There's a few tricky bits around the shower etc but overall it's going well. Here's the latest pics:







Reza worked really hard and put up the lights we bought. It took a little persuading on Reza's part that we needed 5 x £32 lights AAARGH. They do look nice though :)






Finally, Stevo went shopping to get a few bits to finish his room off. Makes such a difference having the TV on the wall :)








I also tidied the lounge ..... but it looks exactly the same, only I know it's cleaner :)