And the trusses go up

Here are pictures from the second day of putting the trusses up. They have been working pretty fast in the last 2 days so the roof is really taking shape. We have also been trying to select our cornices for the house and bought our watertank last weekend. A big 2000L tank, which in today's climate will probably never be full! At least we are doing our bit for the environment.

Start of the roof

The roof trusses were delivered today out of the blue. After some fumbling because they delivered the wrong ones and gave us a bill for the builders' order for the entire month (insert small heart attack here!) things are ready to go. Not sure we will have the roof by Christmas but we can always hope. It has already cooled the place down quite significantly and gives us a good idea for the first time of how high the ceilings really are. Stay tuned for more progress

All bricked up

The brickies finished on Monday and cleaned the place up on Tuesday. It now looks like a real house (except for the lack of roof!) and we have now got a feel for how high the ceilings really are. We are getting a couple of quotes for plastering and for the roof. We still hope to have a roof by Christmas but that is getting closer and closer so we may just miss out. Our new deadline is to be in by Easter next year. Cross your fingers for us!

Even more bricks

After 18 days of bricks, they have done a lot of work. We really can start to get a feel for the room sizes, heights of the walls and how the house will look. Now we are just queuing the roof carpenter to start as soon as the brickies finish.

3 weeks of bricks

Latest update on brickwork. Things are moving along fairly quickly. We have our fingers crossed that they won't need more than a week to get it all finished. Things have moved a bit slower this week because of the scaffolding they need to put up and take back down. Other things have been moving along at the same time. the cabinet maker finished the boxes to go in the shower niches; which don't actually fit the holes!! No other problems to report (please touch wood here!).

11 days of bricks

after 11 days of bricking the sliding doors are in and the brickwork is moving up in the world!! life is pretty busy at the moment so we aren't both getting there twice a day. they are saying it will take about 2 weeks more in total, a bit longer than we thought but apparantely it is because of all the scaffolding they need to put up and move around.

Day 9 of bricklaying

The brickies have been steaming ahead despite lots of rain on Thursday. They managed to get the west wall pretty much bricked to 7 foot. all that is left if the back of the house which should be done friday. the back wall is pretty much just sliding doors so not too much bricking but it will still be time consuming. looks like we are on track to have the shell of the house done to 7 foot by the end of the week. we are very impressed so far; 2 weeks of hard work and a huge part of the bricking has already been finished!

And then there were more bricks

8 days of hard work and here is the result. Only one issue so far, apparantely the door jams for the internal doors are too narrow and we need to get them remade. main problem is that we have already bought them and they have been delivered!! we told the door guy we were building double brick but it seems he thought the brick veneer jams would fit anyway. bugger! oh well, we are trying to sort it over the next couple of days. lucky the brickie (aka joe pesci) happened to look at them a few weeks earlier than he needed to!

More Bricks

More photos from the last two days of bricking. They have been really busy and if all goes well should be done in 4 weeks. Now some of the internal walls are going up, it is easier to see how big (or small) some of the rooms are. There are a few rooms that look quite small, not sure if this is while the bricks are only at 6 foot and the rooms will look bigger as the walls get higher! or is that wishful thinking! Not sure if they are going to work on Saturdays, fingers crossed. Lots of things are happening all at once, the cabinet maker is starting and the electrician has been working out how all the cables will come together in the hallway cupboard.

How's this for workmanship?!

A nerdy close up of the finish of the face bricks. Will look even better once it is cleaned up, but it is really meticulous work so far. On the face bricks that is! The internal bricks which will be plastered seems to be a bit more fun for them!! Bit more mess on those!

Another visit to the block today revealed quite a bit of progress on the bricks. They seem to be bricking up to about 7 foot all the way around and after that I guess they will get the scaffolding in to brick up to 10 foot. The brickie has picked up a few things on the plan that he has asked if we would like changed. For example, moving the location of the decorative pillars in the hallway as they have been drawn too close to a door. They have done the ensuite niche which I think probably should have been one brick longer as it looks a bit tall and narrow. Oh well, we'll see how it all pans out.

First Bricks

The brickies started on Monday, just in time for the rain to start. so first real day at it was probably Tuesday. This morning we caught up with the brickies to view their progress and answer some questions they had for us. We added in a niche in the ensuite shower to put shampoo etc into, although the brickie thought this was funny! No real issues so far; the gap for the door from the garage has been made too small to fit the door we have, so they have agreed to cut the bricks back to allow the 870 door. Otherwise, their workmanship is fantastic. They are hardworking and polite and more than happy to accommodate any changes. Some photos covering the last couple of days.