Day 2: The Destruction Continues

Well it's the second day of the builders and I can't exactly say that I've gone off them, but we've had a few ups and downs. On the up...there is more destruction! More stuff has come out and it's really starting to feel like we're making progress. Plus ex-next door neighbour Luke popped round with his dog Heidi who officially approved of the new fence (i.e. she hiked a leg and christened it as hers...now there's a girl that knows what she likes). How can a visit from a dog not be an up? Here's how it's looking:

The down: We found out that the rushing water sound under the floor was a cracked mains water pipe spewing water into the space under the house. While I was tempted to dig a swimming pool I didn't fancy paddling with mice/rats so the builder has fixed it. The other down...after taking out a radiator the builders for got to cap the open pipe so when the central heating kicked on in the evening we had black, smelly water spewing across the dining room floor. YUM!! So we have no hot water at the moment and things are getting quite dusty, but onwards and upward!!

Backyard Fence Finito

Ok so two posts in one day does feel a tad excessive, but this is just a brief update really. The fence is in! Hooray. It's looking good despite a teeny tiny eensy weensy disagreement with the fence guy about the height of the fence...about 6 inches of disagreement. *Insert sarcastic comment about men here* Anyways...we're still trying to decide the color, but am pretty happy with it! Let me know what you think and any color suggestions!

Day 1 of the Builders

Well that day has finally arrived and it can't have come soon enough if you ask me! The builders are in and they've been very busy ripping out walls, ceilings and floors. We're already getting a really good feeling for how it's going to look when it's done and we're really happy with it. The rooms feel fantastic. Here's Day 1's summary of progress...

Before:

After:

Oh and can I say that I love that they are very tidy. Plastic dustsheets stopping the kitchen from turning into a mess, neatly stacking the rubbish and taking lots of it away each day. These are my kind of builders!  Day two update in the AM!

The Fence Man is my new BFF

Well today is official kick off day for the work on the house. This morning saw the kind of chaos only normally associated with a BOGOF offer on cheetoos at the trailer park Piggly Wiggly. At 8am I was desperately trying to clean my kitchen so the builders didn't think we were total dirtbags. Yes I realize that it was only the guys coming to rip out our fence, but my mama raised me right or at least raised me to know that a clean kitchen is important.

Not long after Rob, the garden guy, showed up with two of his team and then the carpenter arrived so Dom could talk him through all the ins and outs of the piece of architectural beauty we wanted, which would be best enjoyed when running up to use the bathroom. So when I left he was happily chatting away to the carpenter and the last thing I heard him murmur was "So what is your opinion on open string vs closed string stairs in an open space?"

As you can imagine I was all a flutter on the bus on the way home wanting to see the chaos wrecked upon my rotting horrible fence. It really was amazing and I can't believe how different it feels. Despite it not being the nicest day it just felt so open and sunny and totally different than my backyard. Here is how it looks when I got home:

Definitely thinking of raising an army and colonizing next door's garden. After all isn't colonization what the British do best?

Ps. I also love the fence guy because he put down dust sheets and vacuumed up all the dirt his team trekked through my house!

The Builders Cometh Soon (aka let the panic begin)

Well I know it's been a while since I've posted, but this is because the house is, and has been for a couple of week, in complete chaos. Now most of you will know that I don't use this word lightly. Currently the iMac is being used as the tv in our bedroom (who knew I could watch almost all of Time Team online!) and it is a bit hard to type when I can barely see the keyboard. Also, we've been trying to find the right guy to sort out the fence, ripping out shelving, stripping wall paper, packing up most of our worldly goods downstairs and a million other things in preparation for the builders.

So there has been much hard grafting and grumbling going on in the household of late. Spending nine hours steaming wallpaper while hubby is sunning himself in France with a cider in his hand does not lead to marital bliss. It does lead to a reallly derelict looking living room though! I have now realised that my dining room was at one point baby blue and before that a particularly grim shade of green. the good news is that the space feels humongous after ripping out the cupboards. Here are some after pics:

        

And the after shot!

Backyard progress

Well as you can probably guess we've been spending a lot of time in the backyard and by a lot of time I mean like every weekend for a month. This is pretty amazing in itself because in order to do that it meant that we had to have decent weather. In fact we had really nice weather so it was actually really nice to be productive outside. Here is a before picture of the garden just to remind you about what it looked like before we got started:

 Just a small selection of the rubble sacks we ended up with. I liked to consider it a modern art piece...

Here's what it looks like now. So lots of progress, but still lots to go. Despite getting rid of what must be 1.5 tonnes of gravel I can't believe we still have to seive the dirt to get rid of more. I think they are breeding there are so many of them. Good news is the fence is going soon!

        

The view from the far back corner up towards the house. Wow!

A new obsession....

So it's Saturday which means business as usual in this household...tearing up the garden. Well to be fair today was more of a disaster recovery mission. We spent most of it hauling concrete and rubble out to the front and bagging up what was left. However, the really exciting bit was a very nice man named Collin came and paid me .25p per brick for some of my old patio bricks that we are getting rid of! So excited. Money you didn't expect and someone else is going to take away some of my mess. Top of my favorite people list. Even better he said he might need some more and will call me in the week.

Now while I was waiting for someone to pick up my ad on gumtree about the bricks and offer to buy them I started fretting that noone ever would. So I decided that quite frankly I was happy for anyone to take some off my hands. A bit of a brain wave and some lunchtime googling landed me on Freecycle. By no means a new phenomenon, but the first time I've really spent any time exploring it.

I'm by no means an eco-warrior tying myself to trees or not bathing to save the oceans, but I do my bit. Recycle everything I can, always switch off my computer at work when I leave, and try not to throw away perfectly useful things. That's why I love the idea of Freecycle. Someone needs something that you have, but it's sitting around collecting dust and you can give it to them so it has a new lease of life. Happy faces all around! After a short 30 minutes on my local group's site I not only had someone willing to take away some of the busted up concrete has hardcore for planters, but also found new homes for some more of the patio paving and some card paper I've had lying around for almost three years. I just love that I can help someone out and prevent stuff just piling up in the landfill. Plus it seems like, with my local group anyways, you could pretty much kit out your entire house without spending a dime. I can see myself spending a good bit of time on this site... Check out yours at http://www.freecycle.org/