Left of Square:CMET’s Journey, with EBH! Landscaping 16/05

The wall is going slow. We poured the concrete footing on Friday. Having a full time job and 2yo twins makes landscaping a much longer duration task but we are getting there a little bit at a time.

Hi Guys,

It has been a long road, but after almost a month of being in, we now feel settled in our new home! Most of the unpacking is done, although we still need to find a home for some things, as well as one car! What has been a longer process is trying to get our internet access back, but that is another longer and ongoing story!

As promised, here are some of our post move in pics from our new home!

This was our first sunset after we moved in:



Here are some pics of the feature lights that we had installed:









And finally, some of the mirrors that we installed in the upper hallway. It is amazing how much of a difference it makes to the light, and just opening that whole space up for us.





Most of the landscaping has been completed, and I will post some pictures of the progress shortly.

Cheers,

CMET

Hi Guys,

The landscaping is just about complete and our new home is finally starting to not look like a construction zone anymore! We decided to go with a local company called Mirage Landscaping, and we have been really happy with what they have produced for us from the plans.

Here are some pics of what the site was like before they started. This was after all of the long grass and weeds where removed from the site and they started working on obtaining the right levels for the back yard.







This is the progress on the mountain of dirt that had to be shift around the site! In the end, it was double this size, so much so that you couldn't actually see the front window of the house, before they where able to start work on the front yard. One of our neighbours actually thought that we where installing a pool as there was so much dirt being moved around!



After the Easter break, and then about a week of rain, once the levels where correct, they where able to start laying the blocks for our retaining walls. Most of them are quite small, and mainly serving the purpose of holding in the garden beds that they will be planting around the perimeter of the yard in order to hide the fence.









Once this was completed, they where able to start on the paving. We have one section covering our access to the washing line and the second will be our BBQ area near the Alfresco. Looking forward to lot's of entertaining in these areas. DD's are already looking forward to using this area as there performance stage!







And finally, this is the stepping stones that will be installed around the perimeter of the house. They are the same material that we are using for the paving to keep the same theme going through the backyard. The gaps will be filled with pebbles when they are completed.



Most of the soft landscaping has now been completed, and they will be back next week to finish off a timber screen along the BBQ and Alfresco fence as well as a few other small bits and pieces. I will try and post some more pictures over the weekend once we are able to take some pictures in the daylight.

Cheers,

CMET

That sunset is to die for. And those light fittings are beautiful. Were they expensive? Last but not least the landscaping is looking like it will be really nice when finished.

Hi CMET. . .great update & pics Love your light fittings & those mirrors look fantastic, can I ask where you purchased them from?
The landscaping looks great, I really like look of your garden walls & pavers. It will look sensational when it is finished.

Cheers,
Loretta

Looking good! Don't forget to post photos of the finished product, plants and all....

Looking fantastic. I like the stack stone effect of those blocks, very neat. What is going around your steppers?

Thanks Kaytee,

The larger one was around $200 and the smaller one was about $150. We had been looking around for so long for those feature lights and when we both saw those ones, we knew that they were the ones we had to have.

We can't wait for it all to be finished too! DD's are chomping at the bit to get out there and run in there backyard.

Cheers,

CMET

Thanks Loretta,

The mirrors where one of many purchases that we made from IKEA. They are pretty easy to mount; you just need to get your levels and positioning right. Only thing is they do not come with screws, so you will need to purchase your own, depending on what surface you are going into.

We purchased all of the lights for our house from Cosmo Lighting in Baulkham Hills. They had a really great range of all styles of lighting and it gave us an alternative to Beacon.

We really like the look of the pavers and blocks in the backyard too. I can't wait to see them in the daylight on the weekend, not to mention using our new clothes line, as we have been without one for the last six weeks!

Hope you have a great weekend.

Cheers,

CMET

This is fantastic, CMET!! Well done, can't wait to see more!
Love the mirrors - you mentioned screws - but are they visible from the front, how / where are they attached??
Is the Mirage L. doing your driveway too?

Thanks Leonard,

We where not quite sure how it was going to look, as we had not seen it in alot of applications, but are pretty happy with how it has come together with the pavers. Will see how it looks in the daylight and work out if we need to seal it.

We are putting 40mm Nepean river pebbles around the stepping stones.

Have a great weekend!

Cheers,

CMET

Thanks Lex,

The mirrors are held in place by the small brackets at the top and bottom and are screwed to the wall. The top bracket expands so that you can fit it into the bottom bracket, and all of the screws are hidden.

Mirage Landscaping are great, but our driveway was done by EB as part of the build. I am sure that if you needed your driveway done, they would be able to do it, as they did the footings for the brick wall that we have put into the front of our place.

Cheers,

CMET

Thanks, CMET! I really want some wall mirrors and sounds like it was no drama fixing these to the wall. Need to start making an IKEA list

I noticed you didn't go for lots of hard surfaces (ie. concrete / paths etc). Was there any particular reason for it, or just the "like" factor?
And was that a drainage pipe (pipe looking as if it's wrapped in some cloth) alongside your house, between house and small concrete slabs/steps? Does that have to go all around the perimeter of the house, or even more??

Hi Lex,

We should have bought shares in IKEA before we built; that way we would have more to show for it now!

I guess there are two reasons why we went for the look that we have in our landscaping. One is BASIX, so we had a to have a certain percentage of "green space" on the land; and the second was because we wanted a softer look to our home. We replicated and improved on alot of idea's that we brought from our previous house that we had landscaped, so we knew what worked well and what we had to change, so there was alot of the "like" factor as well.

I think the pipe that you are referring to is the termite recirculation system that has been installed for the house by EB. It runs all around the perimeter of the house, and has a few access points for annual re-filling and servicing.

Cheers,

CMET

Hi Guys,

Here are the updated pics of our completed landscaping! Finally my DD's feel like they have escaped from Alcatraz and are free to roam in there new backyard! It only took the youngest an hour before part of the watering system was altered, and then another before they decided it would be fun to do some re=planting of there own with the turf!

Anyway, after some great weather this weekend, here are the completed pics:

The front of the house:





Our new brick fence:





Our new letterbox (the brickie loved us, as he had to cut 15mm off every brick that surrounded the letterbox!):



Our snowflake; great design, but again, we where loved by our brickie:



And to finish off the front, the soft landscaping, complete with stepping stones and small retainer:



Here is our backyard; we finally have a lawn back, and they couldn't wait to start running on it:







These are the finished pics of our paved BBQ area and the retaining walls, so that we could have our flat backyard:





This is a close up of the retaining wall blocks that we used from Adbri Masonry. They are a charcoal block in the Havenstone range:



And finally, here are the completed stepping stones in the various paths around the house:





All that remains now is for the timber screen to be constructed along the fence covering the BBQ and Alfresco area, which should be done some time this week.

Hope you enjoy the pics, I know that we certainly will enjoy making great use of our new backyard in our new home.

Have a great week.

Cheers,

CMET

Very nice! I love the landscaping great choices of the stones and I love the retaining wall stuff!

WOW CMET the completed landscaping looks absolutely stunning!!!!!!!! Love the brick fence the backyard they have really done a tremendous job of it all
What a beautiful place to spend your leisure time in & I can imagine your DD's must love playing in the back area.
It's hard to imagine that you have only been in your home a short time as you have done so much. . .well done.

Loretta

Front and back are looking sensational. You have great taste and style.

What a great job..
Thanks for the update

wow the end result looks awesome