hehe I doubt I was terribly interested in bricks in the 70's but I had read it someone on here previously.

Windows in and all wrapped up. Hoping for the roof to be on next week.
Glad i took my camera on my walk this morning.
Love the kitchen window but i am a little disappointed with the thickness of the frame.

[ img ]
[ img ]
[ img ]
[ img ]

Oo what a nice surprise to find your house wrapped. Now the floor space will start to feel a little more real.

Wow, Lesley, there's so much been done! What's the average time build for brick veneer? Probably much faster than double brick? You'll soon be able to take a walk thru, that will be exciting, imagining yourself living there!!

Oh dear, I have been a bit slack. I really should try to pop in a bit more often.
Treeseachanger Not sure which is faster. I suppose timber frame should be. But you know builders. Never in a hurry, always delays.

Any way we have a little bit of progress this week. Our colourbond went on today.
[ img ]
[ img ]
[ img ]

We met with our builder yesterday to do our final selections. Door handles, bamboo flooring, paint, carpets etc. We also reinstated the fireplace we removed before due to budget. If we dont get it now we will never get it. So its back in.
So we were going through our paint selections and the builder says we have to have the whole house the same colour or pay $190 per feature wall for a different colour. I didn't want feature walls just the living room in a different colour. So guess what 4 feature walls. No way. Argued and got him down to $200. But its still not sitting well with me. I would love to know if this is what they all try. Please share experiences.
Also our bricks are delayed for three weeks but hoping they get some bits done on the inside now that the roof is on.

When we built our 3rd house they wanted $520/feature wall!

I spoke to the painters directly and they did 5 feature walls for $500 in total! We supplied the paint as two of the walls used special effects...

OMG Dee. $520 a wall. Shocking. I cant figure out how they can justify it.

Our builder just charges $200 for each change of paint colour. So we're having two niches painted in the same feature colour. Justification is the extra time for the painters to clean brushes, paint trays, paint edges where one colour meets another. $200 each wall is crazy if they are all the same colour.

Hi Lesley

Just came across your thread....the house looks great and everything seems to be happening so quickly! You must be so excited

We have only just started ours.....the site is being scraped as I type We have been delayed by the rain,but the weather,s looking ok for the next few days, so fingers crossed

You,ve got a nice sized block....what are your landscaping plans?

My DH has got about 200m of retaining wall to build as you can imagine, he can,t wait
Look forward to following your progress

Cheers Mel

Thanks for dropping in Mel. Though it may look like its all moving fast, i'm afraid nothing at all has happened since my last post. And not likely to for the next week or so. They were supposed to be getting on with some of the inside while we wait for the bricks to be delivered. But nothing since the roof was put on. Oh well what can you do.
As for landscaping plans. Well we just planted another 30 hedging plants on Sunday. I think we are now up to about 100 so far and a lot more to go. our block is long and narrow front to back 33 x 120ish. At the back we have already put in a few citrus trees, a couple of olive trees and a nectarine tree. We are on a bit of a slope and plan to level a bit further back from the house so we will need a retaining wall. But ours will only be about 20m. And i think that is quite enough,lol. The rest will stay sloped fo the forseeable future. 200m is Still trying to plan what we will do ith the rest. Hopefully have it worked out soon.
Do you have a thread started yet. I would love to have a look.

PS4314 Well after a bit of rethinking we decided to have the builder just paint the whole house Solver Parchment and we can add a splash of colour to the living later. Other reason being that the builders colour choices were prety restricted so i think if im gonna pay extra i want to choose any colour i want. So That is that!

What have you planted for a hedge? Will you have to retic the plants in summer? And are you planting any big trees?

We have put in a bit of a mix of lilly pilly, photinia, viburnum, pittosporum, bottlebrush, banksia and a mix from a local nursery which i have no idea. She did tell me but by the time i got to the car it was gone! haha. We dont want it too uniform with our block being long and narrow but just a mix of buhes up the sides. I hope it looks ok. A bit of a worry as i have no idea what i am doing. I will take some pics when it starts to come together. I have lots of ideas but we really have to sit down and work it out. We def want a large veg garden, fruit trees and we will see how it goes after that. My friend is giving me a couple of oak seedlings due to be planted in September and we will hopefully have a couple of gums for fire wood at the back. I would love a couple of Acer and Steven wants a palm or two out the front. All ideas but certainly no definate plans. How are your plans going Treeseachanger??

Sorry meant to say that once established these should need little watering. We started planting in summer and it was a nightmare keeping them alive as little seedlings. But they all survived but 1.

Wow, great minds think alike! We are actually planning to have a very similar mix but without the banksia (clay loam soil) or viburnum. Add some melaleucas in their place, and you have exactly our selection. At least at this stage! What photinia did you buy?

Nada, zip, nothing, zilch is happening. The brakes are on. We have to wait until March 2013 for titles now...was supposed to be March this year. Nothing we can do about it. I have LSL from work up my sleeve, so when they do start building we will get down there every opportunity. ( Lucky my mgr is understanding, as I have pressure from higher up to take my leave this year.) So meantime I'm just being nosey, living vicariously through every one else's builds!!!!!

^^ SOunds like our mix too... We also have clay loam. We have divided our acre into a 25 m "front" yard, then house, then "backyard", then vegie garden, then orchard, then last section is to run a couple of lambs each year for meat. Currently finishing the fencing around the vegie garden so that chooks can free range through the orchard without creating havoc!

well we all have great taste in plants Treeseachanger that is a long wait for you. It will come round quick enough. I wonder how many times your mind will change while you wait. We bought photinia robusta. I am thinking of adding a bit more colour when we get round to planting from the house to the front. Have to do a bit more research though.

Dee. I like the sound of your layout. Apart from the lambs. We also have 25m at the front then house and so far the fruit trees are at the very back. Would love to see some pics or point me in the direction if you have some on here already. sounds very similar to ours. Or what ours will be like eventually.

Click on the link in my signature-that will take you to my current thread. I'm about to upload some pics actually.

Hi Lesley
Oh I hope something happens soon.....it,s so frustrating when nothing seems to be happening for no apparent reason

That mix of trees sounds great! They will look fantastic in a year or so
I love olive trees.....we,ve got lots of them scattered over our property and some of them are huge (we think they would be around 50yrs old) my youngest loves playing in them

We,ve planted the same as you except the photinia.We,ve got 9.5 acres and have planted double plantings of various natives around our perimiter.The banksia,s and grevilleas seem to love it here.....I think we,ve planted around 300 so far,but once the house is built then we,ll probably double that
We had been watering them all by hand,but we,ve got the bore up and running now,so have put them all on drippers now

I,ve got a thread (no idea how to put in a link ) it,s called 'Our house on the hill'........

Cheers Mel

Man, that's a lotta hand watering!! What an effort
To post the link just copy the entirety of the forum address that is on your site (the forum.homeone.com.au address) and paste it into here....

Thanks Dee. Your garden looks amazing. I really hope we are able to do the same. I have a feeling i will hae a few questions fo you in the future.

Mel, that was a huge amount of watering. I am going to try to find your thread.Hope you have got lots of pictures on there.