PS, I forgot to tell you....

That we sold our house in Venus Bay. Houses take a long time to sell down there so we were really blessed! We settled in July which has helped our building fund immensely. We will miss the house though, it has been a great part of our family's life over the last five years or so!!

Spring, Spring, I love Spring!!

Here are some photos I took today in the beautiful sunshine. You can see that all the roof trusses are on. Tomorrow the roofers are coming to set up the scaffolding then next week they start fascias, gutters and roof sheets.
This is our gorgeous front veranda. Darren is sitting where the stairs will go leading up to the front door. We really wanted the brick pillars and base to tie in with the garage. We used Clinker bricks and they look fantastic.
The familiar view from the driveway.
The facade of my garage up the top, next to the veranda.

We are getting excited again after a bit of a down time at the end of winter. It just seemed that we had been building forever and not getting all that far. Now the roof is near, we can see some light again. Next will come windows (they are ready and waiting for delivery). Then weatherboards and not far to lock up!!
Our oldest boy Jake has now left school and is working with his Dad every day. He has NEVER liked school and although we both would like him to have stayed, we didn't see the point as he was very unhappy and not doing any work (hence failing!). Hopefully one day he might go back to study something or other but in the meantime, as long as he is being productive, we are OK with it.
It is helpful having a labourer full time. Jake loves clamouring around the roof especially! It's amazing how much quicker and nimbler youth are! He has worked out from his bedroom verandah he will be able to climb out onto my garage roof and then right up to the main roof. He has picked out a "nest" for himself in a meeting of two valleys where he wants to set up some hammocks.
Jake's dream in life is to play guitar in a band and travel to the Carribean. There he is going to buy a boat to live on, have a monkey for a pet and brew a new exotic drink that no one has seen before.
Well, better go and attend to my mounds of washing!
Jodie.

A holiday, an abcess and lots of rain.

Wow, it has been ages since I posted on our blog! I hope you haven't given up reading it!

We have been away on a wonderful holiday, towing a caravan up through Central Australia to Darwin and back. We were away for 4 and a half weeks. We travelled with two other families (we had 17 kids between us all!!). It will be something we will all remember forever. Even though it did cut into our building time, we wanted to go with our friends when the opportunity arose. The kids are getting older too and you never know if they'll want to travel with you in a few years time!

Well, after a wonderful time of freedom and sunshine, we came home, back to the real world. Unfortunately Darren was really unwell when we came home and couldn't work for around 10 days or so. He had an abcess under his arm that was very painful. He had a fever for quite a while and couldn't move his arm much at all. It was horrible and very frustrating but eventually, after lots of antibiotics, it went away. He was very anxious to get back into the house after so much time off but as soon as he was well enough to start, down came the rain and it has hardly let up for 2 weeks now!! I know how much we need it so I won't complain. It has delayed things a lot though. The main jobs have been roof trusses and bricklaying which is not fun in the wet.

Still, a lot has happened since the last lot of photos so I'll put up some more to show our progress. All the ground level roof trusses are on and the bricklayer has done the front of my garage upstairs and started the front veranda base and pillars. It looks great!! The top level roof trusses will be here this week then it's on with the Colourbond!

Darren's beautiful dormer windows. The nearest one is in the "grown ups" loungeroom where the open fire will be, the second one is in the guest room.

Matt on the bobcat in front of the upper storey. To the left of the photo will be a big double storey verandah with french doors opening from the bedrooms upstairs.
This is our bunch climbing Uluru. Ben is in a green T shirt just above the middle of the photo. Tim is on the left kneeling down with a black cap on.

Ben and Matt near Alice Springs.

Amber at Uluru visitors centre.

I've got photos of lots more places but they are on another computer so I'll post them later.

Up we go!

Here is the ground floor frame extending over to on top of the garage.
The first floor begins to appear! Darren has got a real run on the first floor frame and he's done it all by himself! He was going to get some help but had to wait for people so he just up and did it! He feels much happier when things keep on moving along. The weather is starting to get quite wet so we really want to get the roof on ASAP. Jake is helping him this afternoon. The frame should be finished in a few days and then we can order the roof trusses. We've also got some quotes on the roof and that can start as soon as we're ready. We're having Colourbond and getting roofers in to do all the roof, gutters, etc. We need to look at some display homes to choose a colour but we think we like Woodland Grey which is a classic, dark grey.Jake is standing at the front of the house in Nicky and Amber's room. On the floor is a wall ready to lift. You can see the Hebel flooring down. It's aerated concrete sheets and is really sound proof. It's very quiet walking around up there.
Here, I'm looking across the stairwell which will all be open. Jake is standing at the entrance to his bedroom. The stairs come up to the first floor just to the left of where he is standing.
Looking down from the first floor to the rooms on top of the garage. This is the Guest quarters!!
Just a bit of Autumn colour. That is our new car, a 1997 Landcruiser. I absolutely love it, burning around the hills on the dirt roads is so much better! The beloved Tarago has finally wound down after 430,000km!

Just a few family pictures.

Here's Jake, Ben and friends camping at the block.
Our gorgeous kids. From left at back: Jake and Amber, front: Nicky, Ben, Matt and Tim.

Pics at last!

At last I have uploaded photos from my camera. The ground floor frame is now completed. The pic below shows the first half of it. It actually extends right out to the left on top of the garage as well.Below shows the floor joists on top of the garage (view from the back). This is now completely framed up as well and joined to the main house. This area is our formal lounge and our "guest quarters". We're having a guest room with a queen bed and big bunks as well as it's own bathroom. We really want family and friends to be able to stay over easily.This is our entrance hall. To the left at the back is my laundry which is my favourite room!!

This will be the view from my kitchen sink!!
Here's Darren sitting at the front door.
Since these photos we have done more framing and today the first floor sheets are being lifted on. We are using Hebel which is 75mm aerated concrete. It is for sound proofing the kids rooms upstairs!! The sheets are really heavy and need to be crane lifted up. The truck came yesterday and attempted to get up our driveway but the power steering failed. Guys came out to try and help but it ended up having to stay there overnight. This morning a mechanic came out but he ended up getting lost and bogged in a dead end street. Someone came and got the mechanic out then he finally came and fixed the truck but it still couldn't get up the driveway enough so only half the pellets went up. He's going to come back when the ground is drier and try again with a lighter load. Of course we have to pay for each extra trip out.

I guess that's building in the hills!!!

Lastly, please feel free to pop out and visit the site. Darren is there most days and he'd love to give you a tour!

It's been a while

It has been a while since I updated. I was away over the holidays and now my camera won't upload to the computer. It has malfunctioned so the error message says!! I have so many great photos of our progress but you'll have to wait till I get the camera fixed.
We have done heaps of work. The ground floor sheets and frame are up and over the last few days we have done the flooring on top of the garage and across the join to the main house. It is so exciting and inspiring to be able to walk through the house and envisage how it will be. I love it so much!! We worked on the design for over 3 years and it is perfect for our family. I have lots of little personal bits like a walk in and out "dumping room" for schoolbags and stuff. My laundry is the size of a bedroom with a huge central folding bench and a shute from upstairs. It backs on to our wardrobe so I'm also having a little roller door to transport our clothes. I have also worked out storage spots for everything from boogie boards to the Christmas tree!!
Darren is so happy to have got a decent run in on building. The kids have helped on various days and all in all things are very positive around here!! Tonight, Jake and Ben are camping at the block with some friends. They have a campfire going in an old washing machine bowl and are cooking their own dinner and toasting marshmellows etc. It is a great thing for them!!
I will post some photos as soon as I can. Take care, Jodie.