It's all happening...

Monday
Electrician, plasterers, builders
Tuesday
Builders
Wednesday
Aircon man
Thursday
Plumber, roofer, plasterboard delivered

And we have not been idle. Things on order came in - we went a-Bunning to pick up the laundry trough and buy more taps for the washing machine, and to Bentons to collect our shower rail. And we're making progress on choosing the colour for the bathroom acrylic panels.

The house now looks like this, pipes and wires everywhere.

We'll have one of these, and one of those, and...

Friday we go to Altona Bunnings and return with a toilet suite, a vanity basin, and 3 taps. While we're there we finally make a decision on both the kitchen sink tap and the shower rail, but, you guessed it, neither are in stock. We pick up the kitchen tap back at our "home" Bunnings in Port Melbourne, having ordered it while at Altona.
Saturday it's off to the Good Guys, who are having a Black Friday sale. Not only do we get a good deal on a Bosch gas cooktop and dishwasher, but they source the Panasonic oven that we want for a good price, even though they don't actually stock it. Really are Good Guys. And because the oven isn't in stock there will be a wait before any of this is delivered, and since we probably don't need any of it before Christmas we don't have to find somewhere to store it immediately.
At a local bathroom showroom we also find a shower rail that we both really like, and like better than the one we had previously decided on at Bunnings. Now we're looking to find the quickest way of getting hold of one. The laundry trough we want is also playing hard to get - but we have the specs which is probably enough for now, and it's on order.
Plasterers due Monday, plumber Thursday - it's all go this week.

A-Bunning we will go

Peter and I now have to go shopping. Today we went to our local Bunnings and tried to buy a toilet, a vanity basin, a shower fitting, and two flickmixer taps for the basin and shower respectively. Each time we made a decision from the display on what we would like to buy, we discovered there were none in stock. For every single item. Off to Bunnings Altona in the morning, where it appears that all these things will be available.
Meanwhile we are looking at combi ovens, gas cooktops, bathroom panelling....
We will be much poorer in a week or so.

Roof back on

Despite the heat (32 degree day), the roofer put the skillion roof on, with shiny new insulation in place below.

Electric spaghetti

Chris the electrician arrives at 7am this morning, and we spend an hour going through the electrical plan with him, specifying lights, powerpoints, etc.
By about lunchtime the there are wires dangling everywhere - out of walls, down from the roof, even up through the floor. We just hope we haven't forgotten anything.
Part of this exercise revealed a potential problem - if we put in split system airconditioning  modern electrical induction hotplates, and a combination oven as we were planning, we may not have sufficient power, and it is a painful and very slow process to upgrade. So we think we are going to revisit our cooktop decision and have gas.

Window woe

The new big 3-part sliding door is now installed, wall battening is complete.
The new rafters and ceiling battens are all in place ready to go.
The double-glazed sash windows to replace the original Victorian windows arrive, but when builders Chris and Luke go to install them, they find that the hole in the outside part of the cavity brick wall is smaller than the hole in the inside, which is what Tony the boss measured. So they have a very messy day cutting bricks to widen the windows slightly, but they are in and look great.

All kinds of interesting things happen...

New sliding door for the back, just like the one at 8 Finlay Street.

The frame for the sliding door into the bathroom also arrived.


The roofer came today to work out what's needed to put up the new bit of roof and make the rest really leakproof.

And the chippies have been working away in the heat - we have more rafters, more battens.

The walls in the bathroom have been stripped back to the bricks ready for panelling.

Going on up...

More battens on the walls...














...and new rafters.

...and up, and roof comes down.

Battening of the walls now more than half done.

Back bit of roof, rusty tin and rotting beams, all comes down.

Battening goes up...

Carpentry work recommenced on Thursday, after the concrete had cured. We are putting battens on all the old brickwork in the back room to support plaster sheet, rather than trying to repair the old solid plaster. This way the walls will be straight and vertical, which will be a nice change.