The final assault begins

Ok well those of you who are friends with me on Facebook will know that today was Day 1 of Bathroom round 2. Very exciting! This is the LAST major building work planned to get the house how we want it.  It also means that we are one big step closer to finishing the house for the end of the year.

Now some of you will remember that we had our bathroom redone a while ago when the kitchen was being done (http://aoldhouse.blogspot.com/2009/06/real-destruction-begins.html). But this episode of bathroom renovation taught us many things including:

• Black is not a good color for tiles, especially in a hard water area
• There is a special kind of wood you are supposed to use on bathroom floors (marine ply for those of you interested)

and most importantly:

• YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR

So having not paid very much it wasn't entirely surprising when the shower started to leak and stain the kitchen ceiling and the floor tiles started to crack in half due to the water soaking into the ply ad swelling. Joy joy joy!

So older, wiser and with some money in our pocket (but not for long) we've got back in the lovely builders that we used for the last major works. They were really great so we thought why not! 

Today is Day 1 = Destruction Day. I left to a bathroom fully intact and without a care in the world and have come home to this:

All of our furniture is crammed in the front room!

This is why I love that my husband is an engineer. He can draw things like this and they look like they are supposed to!

This is the final look we have taken as our inspiration. So lots more light and just brightening up the whole space.

Let us know what you think and I'll try to update this every day there is decent progress.

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!!

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!

Backyard destruction

Well I'm going to make this short because hubby is off on trip 2 of 3 to the tip and I have to look helpful when he's back. I've got some finished pictures of the shelves avec les livres as you may say if you are French. It looks so nice and I'm really pleased. Here is the finished product!

The other big news is the backyard. After getting multiple builders quotes we were SHOCKED to find out how much it would cost to pay someone to redo the paving, fence etc in our little backyard. So the ever practical hubby decided that there was definitely some stuff we could do ourselves....cue me with a shovel a mountain of gravel and lots of rubble sacks....oh and a hammer, hand saw and whatever else was needed.  I learned a few things from this: 1) gravel is the devil's own playtoy (it's heavy, dirty and we have tons of it), 2) decking should not be put in a damp corner that never gets the sun...it rots...badly and 3) we're insane. Enough of that here's how it looks in progress:

PS. We also have wild blackberries growing in our backyard so super excited when those are ready!