Mr Squiggle has paid a visit

And drawn lines ALL over our slab.

This could well be our THEATRE SLIDING DOORS.  Woohooooooooooooooooooo

And this is our kitchen window - isn't it beautiful???

I'm reliably informed (thank you Deb) that actual framing, building, construction type activity is going on as I type.  Exciting!!!!!  Can't wait to get down on the weekend to check it out :)

Nap time...

Our slabby is having a little rest at the moment before its slumber is violated on Tuesday by the frame guys.
But our builder hasn't been napping... we've got a new SS, Luke, and we've got a lovely invoice to pay!!!!

Have a lovely looooong weekend everyone. xxx

Nice day for a...

SLAB POUR

This is for my gorgeous man who couldn't get down to see it for himself...

Isn't she a beauty?  And totally worth waiting 15 months for!!! 

What's for brekky?

On Fieldstone Crescent there's a HUGE serving of WAFFLES on a bed of smooth gravelly goodness!!!

Thank you Kerry for sending me this image last night, and to Deb for the "site alert".  Fingers crossed for good weather today (for Kerry's slab pour) (for our boxing up) and for our pour tomorrow.  Please, please, please let our pour be tomorrow!!!

Here slabby slabby slabby....

This is as close as I can get to posting a piccie of our slab. Why? Evidently there's a massive backlog in slab world due to the bizarre weather. I can accept this - to a point!

Our permit was received on January 12.
According to the BOM website, we had rain on 5 other week days for the month of January. Our block sat idle.

February to date has had 13 non-rain affected work days, and all we've had are a handful of pegs, some white paint, a swish of concrete and a few pipes. In total, they've been on site for 3 days in the month.

I understand that Carlisle use an independent contractor to prepare and lay their slab, but they could not have possibly done any of the preparation until last Friday as Carlisle hadn't completed the plumbing.

We're now being told that our pour MAY happen on March 3rd.  We are less than impressed!!!!!

Oh Danny Boy...

...the pipes, the pipes....

Can you believe the progress??  Not just on our site, but I swear that our left +1 neighbours didn't have that frame when we were there 2 days ago.  Our immediate left neighbours are now scraped, and our right neighbours have commenced framing.  It looks suspiciously like a double storey to me.  They'll get a lovely view of our master bedroom, ensuite, pool, all the good bits!!!!!

Look what's a-pier-ed...

An incredibly gorgeous temp fence;

And if you peer really hard through the fence, you'll see...

...that our concrete piers have been poured.

Extreme pier close-up;

Who would have thought that holes drilled into dirt and filled with concrete could be THIS exciting?????????

A load of rubbish...

No, this isn't my usual "nothing's happening" rant, because....

...we have a bin.  (and a couple of spare tyres - never know when they'll come in handy!)


But wait, there's more....

Pegs too.  They've begun the set out, with plumbing and piers underway early this week, slab prep later in the week, and the pour expected next Tuesday (weather permitting!).

It's getting exciting!!!!!

What Paddy shot at

One of my "boys" at work came out with this "What Paddy shot at" phrase a few months ago.  After a solid 20 minutes of tears-and-all-type laughter, we HAD to google it to find out what it means.  Turns out, it's a really old fashioned saying for NOTHING.  And that is exactly what's been going on at the orange house this week - a big fat nothing.

The first date we were given for our slab pour was Jan 20 = gone.

The second date thrown around was Jan 24, which is Monday.  And considering we haven't been plumbed or boxed up, I'm guessing this is pretty unlikely.

Our CSC did tell us last week that we were due to have our portaloo delivered any day, and our scrape was booked for the 12th of Feb. 

I'm fairly sure this is our block...pre-christmas.  Hmmmmm.

SS

Nope, we haven't purchased a new commodore, we have a Site Supervisor, Rod, and he's going to be brilliant, I can just tell :)

He intends to call every Thursday afternoon with an update of the past week's progress and where we're heading next. He may regret this, but he's okay with us calling him every day if we feel the need, and he'll be happy to put our detail oriented minds at ease.

I was actually expecting a gruff, blokey bloke who likes to keep clients as far away as possible. But he's come across as enthusiastic and totally hands on with us.

.....

The much anticipated slab party will have to be postponed until Monday 24th (maybe even later if the rain keeps on doing it's thing), but we've waited 12 months already, so what's another 4 sleeps??

.....

Carlisle have allowed us to change our splashback colour (don't yell at me Deb) AND after a fair few emails, they've agreed to amend the height of the double doors into the theatre from standard 2040mm to 2340mm in line with the rest of the house per our original request (we didn't notice the reduced height on final plans).

So it's back to Spectra tomorrow morning to pick a new splashback colour. Any suggestions....??

Fixed site costs = WINNER!!!

It was virtually a flip of the coin type decision to fix our site costs some months ago. We'd already had soil tests through Porter Davis which came back as M class, we had minimal fall (which is,as Janine says, "bugger all")so when Carlisle quoted us 10K for site costs, we were REALLY tempted to run the risk and not fix.

What we didn't know was there was an overlay on our land which I've posted about before, and we also didn't know that our slab would require some additional foundations in the form of 16 piers (which I now know are holes drilled down into stable ground and then filled with concrete for the slab to rest upon).  And, thanks to fixed site costs, we don't have to pay extra for the permits and additional requirements the overlay has brought with it OR the piers.  WINNER!!

I'm completely fascinated by this process.  Hope I can be there on slab pour day... January 20... 23 more sleeps!!!!!