Working holiday

 

 

I hope none of you have been eagerly awaiting an update, because I've just realised it has been a VERY long time. In fact the last time I posted on the blog, I was a spring chicken, 29 years young and now I am 30, 30 years old. That's how long it's been, the other morning I pulled 3 grey hairs out of the very top of my head (they're crazy if they think I'm going to believe that ridiculous rumour that if you pull them out, more grow in their place, I doubt it, they've seen what happened to their friends) I would like to say that the grey hairs had nothing to do with the build but I'd probably be telling a lie.

It can get a little hard... I know, it's a romantic idea... Building your dream home from the ground up by yourselves, with a while lotta help from your old man and not a huge amount of work by sub contractors. It's easier on the pocket! Absolutely! I've said it before, there is no way we could build this house and live the life we want to live (not slaves to a giganto mortgage) if we weren't doing it this way...and it will be incredibly rewarding in the end. But we go through waves of "holy crap, this is pretty full on", the only weekends we have off are for weddings and surely we'll stop being invited to those soon because we are such bad friends who have to say 'no' to everything because we're "building the house!" So for the last month with everyone being so busy with the silly season in full swing, things have felt a little slow going...I have to remind myself, you're not going to see lightening-speed progress when you really only have 2 days a week to commit to the job.

But it's all bout to change, now that we're on holiday - a working holiday.

We're not back to work until the 13th of Jan, that's 18 days away which in Waikuku house building time is 9 weekends worth of work!! That's going to make quite the difference. So, it's time to catch you up on what's been happening and where we're at so I can keep you in the loop during this building boot camp we have ahead of us.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The whole front of the house is covered in the shadowclad (apart from one tiny patch, which we'll get to soon enough) the cedar has been stained in Cabot's - beach house grey and it's piled up in the corner of one of the rooms just gagging to be put up on that chimney, I can't wait for that day!!

 

You may have noticed the lovely piles of dirt that we have piled up out the front, they're from all the drains that have been dug in....in fact, you should probably know, we now have a toilet... That's a huge deal. There are no real walls around this toilet but it does the same thing and we are happy as can be about it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I've made a good sized dent in the mammoth task of insulation....excuse the blurry photo. Time is of the essence when handling pink batts....get them in and away from you as soon as possible. It was scratchy and prickly and just horrible to work with. Also, each item of clothing I am wearing above belongs to Guy. #shopmylook #WIWT

 

Below is a shot of the guest bedroom ceiling all done, this happened so quick because I had Guy on hand to help. We had a masterful system down with him cutting and throwing them up to me so I could install them.

 

 

 

 

Then it happened, I had to cease working with pink batts because Guy and Dad had to run the rest of the wires through the ceiling, so it was on to the wall insulation. Hooray! I cried...because I had actually been looking forward to it. No more balancing on Papa's old wooden stepladder and climbing through frames...also I have no upper body strength so having my arms in an above your head position for a long amount of time was not easy for me...and best of all, GOODBYE PINKBATTS. We have chosen Terra Lana natural wool insulation for the walls and what a difference! No protective clothing required, no tiny fibers of glass irritating my skin and to cut them to size you simply tear the wool against the grain. So amazing right! Well not exactly....hahaha! I tricked you. All of the above is wonderful and true but wow, when I started to need to cut the wool to size long ways (many of our studs are closer together than the size we have) which is going with the grain, impossible! Even Fat Max (our grunty craft knife) couldn't do it without a lot of elbow grease and a useless shredded piece of leftover wool.

 

The only thing that works is a pair of old sheep shears. Dad gave them a good 'tickle up' by sharpening them as much as he could. Great for cutting through the wool, and my skin multiple times. I also have a bruised palm BUT I got a whole room done....oh and did I mention once it's installed you have to staple it to the framework. It's pretty time consuming but honestly I actually think it's worth it. Wool is naturally pest and fire retardant and it doesn't shrink or break down over time. By stapling it to the top frame I assume this also prevents any slumping over time. So my end call is, the pros outweigh the cons.....if you access to some shears.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jed was a huge fan, and he kept the wool warm for me while I was installing. He never tried this with the pink batts funnily enough.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We also got our western mound planted and barked and the fence railings put up. We did that to protect the trees as much as we can and get some privacy from a neighboring shed until the plants grow! We're stoked with it, the weeds thought it was great too because they decided to crash the party and grow their little hearts out. Why can't the plants we PLANT grow like weeds! Haha.

 

There you go, that's where we're at... Let's hope by the end of this holiday we've made plenty of progress and I've made plenty of posts.

 

HOPE YOU ALL HAD A FABULOUS CHRISTMAS!!!

 

Waikuku Welcome

 

 

 

 

What a welcome home I received on Tuesday. The sun was BLAZING and the beach was perfect.

The weeds hadn't stopped growing or pulled themselves out though. A bit rude, I thought.

 

 

 

 

It was a great day to come home to because as much as I loved Auckland and was insanely jealous of all the cool restaurants, flower markets and shops. They do not have Waikuku Beach on Ponsonby Road.

Talk about our happy place. I mean, this was Guy's lunch break!!! I got up to my knees while frolicking in the waves and it was actually quite warm. If I had a cossie I would have dived straight in....up to my waist, because I'm not a huge fan of the ocean. I know, gasp! Am I even a kiwi? I promise I am, don't get me wrong, I LOVE sand....I could lie on that all day. But the ocean... As soon as something touches my foot I can't get out fast enough (it makes surfing hard, which is why I don't do it), some may call me paranoid, bit I ask you....why are so many scary movies based on the sea? Jaws 1-100, Open Water, which also had a sequel...because 2 people being eaten by sharks just wasn't enough and then there was Deep Blue Sea.... The one where a shark eats Samuel L. Jackson like he's a French fry.

It's because there are scary things in the ocean that can eat you. I'm a river girl, give me a river to swim in any day! The only scary river movie I can think of is River Wild, which means I only need to fear Kevin Bacon while swimming.... And seeing as Kev lives in Hollywood, I think I'm in the clear.

OK, see how my brain works...wildly off topic in milliseconds. No wonder my report cards always said 'easily distracted'. Back to the wonders of Waikuku, which only has happy vegetarian sharks with full bellies swimming near it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

It wasn't all play mind you, I did pull out a trailer full of weeds from our front mound and help finish off a fence and some irrigation. I also did some drop saw cavity batten cutting the other day, which I forgot to tell you all about. It was very exciting and made me feel like a real builder. That's what's been happening on the house lately, cavity battens and flashings....they don't exactly make for great photos and reading.... But I took a photo anyway.

 

 

 

Whenever I look at this photo all I can think about is the future decking..... how great it will be to sit on and look out at the native bush that we planted (at my feet) and all the happy birds tweeting away their thank you's for their bushy retreat. I will cheers them with a pimms and wish them a good day eating worms and berries and pooping on people's heads for luck. Truly the only living thing that could get away with such a thing, I'm pretty sure a bird started that rumour.

 

 

Happy Friday X

 

Go and type Marcus Foster into your spotify search and listen to him. So good. Apart from that strange woods song....it's a bit strange. So to be fair he did warn us.

 

Ico traders sale

 

 

Oh dear, this is an injustice. I thought this was posted 2 days ago!

If you don't follow Ico Traders on Facebook, you now have ONLY today to take full advantage of the sweet deal that Miranda from Ico traders has offered up to us all on her birthday..... A whopping 50% off furniture and lighting! That's incredible!!

I have so many picks, but in my eyes the hero piece is this incredible hanging chair! Miranda worked on the design of this and got it just right, she has a love for hanging chairs and I share that love. In fact we sometimes had conversations soley about hanging chairs.

Go and spend an hour on her website and get anything that needs getting, but if I were you I wouldn't be missing out on this beautifully formed fella. He will be hanging at my house on Christmas Day. I may not have lined walls or fully functioning bathrooms but I WILL have this chair.

 

The school loves NZ

 

 

And NZ loves the school.

Well, I did it, I got brave, I became my alter ego (the love and ginger ninja) and I went to Megan Morton's science of styling course in Auckland.

Ok, so my friend Caroline will tell you that I almost didn't get out of the car when she dropped me off in the morning, and I may have fantasised about her coming in and standing at the back of the class until she saw me settle in and make a friend. But then I remembered that in a few short days I will be 30 and that I was being ridiculous, I didn't need Mama Caroline to look after me.... I just had to go in there and hope that everyone wasn't so cool that I would be rendered mute and weird.

Result, everyone was very cool but also very nice!! The first girl I met was Hayley of HHD Event Styling, we realised quickly that we attended the same high school, she recognised me and I quickly remembered her as the 5th former with the bananas in pajamas backpack who I thought was super cool (in case you weren't a 90's teenager...they were the business, I had a matching b's in pj's watch with my best friend) and coincidentally that friend had her unbelievably beautiful wedding styled by Hayley earlier this year. Small world. Hayley really has an amazing eye and I can't think of anyone quite like her in the (03) area, so I thought it worth mentioning to all of you Canterbury brides.

 

 

 

Enter Megan Morton, this super tall, gorgeous woman with ridiculous blue eyes (sorry do I sound like I have a crush on her, ok I'm not sorry, I do) she is such a warm and approachable person (not that I was brave enough to approach her all on my own) and actually kind of hilarious. You know how you watch interviews with Cameron Diaz and you think "yea, I wanna be her best friend" she's like that!!!!! She was full of shiny pearls of wisdom when it came to making spaces look like they just fell into a house looking amazing. Actually some tips included just actually letting things fall. But that's all I'm going to say because next time she is in town, you must go.

 

 

 

I also went to Stephanie Stamatis's (aka IG user Stephanie_somebody) class on instagram, that girl just captures things so beautifully and makes every corner of the world look amazing through her iPhone. We were very lucky and were given some photos of hers. Which I love! Again, a very inspiring woman, who is letting her creativity and natural talent cut it's own path for her to follow. Note to self: be more like that. Stephanie and her fiancé have taken off for a quick trip around the south of the South Island, I'm looking forward to seeing the photos she captures of that area and if you are too, follow her on instagram

I so wished I could have gone to Kara Rosenlund's vignette class (damn, regret!) it would have been awesome to do some hands on styling and it looked so great on everyone else's instagram feeds. Check them out on #theschoollovesNZ

 

 

Image by Gemma from www.blackbirdgem.blogspot.co.nz

 

 

Auckland in General was also just incredibly good fun. It helped that I was swamped with freakin gorgeous friends to catch up and hang with. But honestly, the food. THE FOOD. I pretty much ate my way through Auckland and Holy Cronut! It was good. So here is my list of where you should eat.....

 

 

Late night Diner - because mac cheese and chilli con carne at 12am is ALWAYS a good idea

Mexico - the guac and corn chips and the beef tacos....just, YES.

The Food Truck Garage - you probably saw him on tv, going here is so much better than licking the tv screen

Depot - we ate tapa after tapa and had red wine after red wine in tumblers like cool kids. Delish

Federal Deli - the Banoffie Pie, I just... Have no words. But there is a little drool in the corner of my mouth. Ew

Petit Bocal - the best breakfast with the most delicious bacon. And they are all French and beautiful! Legit.

Zomer - best juice in town surely. It was like drinking raw liquid energy. And some damn good Guac.

 

 

 

 

 

Oh yea, I had my first Cronut. Endangering waist lines everywhere. And I'm the rebellious type.

 

 

 

 

I also got to Junk and disorderly which was at the top of my list. My heaven on earth. I found a few treasures to bring home with me. I also found many treasures that I couldn't logistically bring home with me. stupid baggage allowance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

So in Summary, l do love the School I also love Auckland. It was good to me.... Better than good. And for those of you that have a 'Jafa' attitude towards AKL. I will leave you with this short story.

 

On Saturday night after gorging myself on tapa's and banoffie pie, my friend Cecil dropped me off at our friend Caroline's house where I was staying. Caroline was out babysitting and her flatmates were either out or asleep. I tried my key, I heard a lock turn and I tried to open it. Nope. Something was wrong, a deadlock had come into play (*more on that soon) and I was locked out. I checked my phone, flat as a pancake... No surprises there. I knocked for awhile, no one heard. I was outside, phoneless, with no idea where I actually was because I have absolutely no sense of direction. Usually I just follow Guy while I look at everything....yes, kind of like a toddler. There was no other option (in my eye's) I needed to charge my phone and coming from Waikuku where all the neighbours are amazing. It seemed the best thing to do at 11:30pm was to go and ask the neighbours if I could charge my phone. So I wandered next door and a man named Roger answered.

 

 

I know what you're thinking. She was murdered. Well..... I wasn't.

 

 

I put my phone on one of their chargers and popped upstairs to polish off a bottle of his Syrah with him while we chatted away about not much really. He was so lovely....I didn't meet his boyfriend Jason, he was already in bed and probably pretending to be asleep while listening to the crazy girl in his living room thinking "what the?!??". I was having such a good time I actually totally forgot that I was stuck for awhile. Eventually I went down and grabbed my now charged phone to call Caroline who thought I was mental. And who decided to return home to get me immediately (in case of murdering). I bid Roger farewell and went next door to bed, where my room looked directly into the living room I was just in, I gave him a big wave and hit the hay.

A testament to humans, Aucklanders and computer software programmers everywhere. I made sure to leave them a card and a replacement bottle of Syrah before I came home. Thank you Roger, for not murdering me and for giving me wine.

 

*turns out I was just unlocking and locking the deadlock! not the actually handle lock. I know this because I did it again the next night after my class with Stephanie, but this time Caroline was there to wake up (you should never wake Caroline up) stare angrily at me, and tell me. "ITS NOT THE DEADLOCK, ITS YOU!"

 

 

 

X

 

A steal

 

 

How great are these hanging planters from ezibuy. I love the globe shaped one and can see a cluster of 2 or 3 hanging in our new home. Good thing they have a sweet discount when you buy 2!

Find them here Oh! How I love a good bargain.

 

Progress

This is just a quicky... check this out!!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Woooahhhhh! I love seeing things like that! And it makes me feel like we've done loads.

 

 

Standing in the kitchen/dining area looking out... Can't wait to get the soffits on those eaves out front. It's going to look pretty exceptional.

 

 

I love the western and eastern sides of the house... Above is looking towards our master bedroom and the end of hallway window. The soffit will carry along the roofline which is going to look pretty cool.

 

 

This weekend is a big one with loads of planting on the western mound. Can't wait to show you all a before and after of that one.

 

 

 

Windows

 

 

It's been very slow going lately.... So slow that I lost all motivation to fill any of you in with what is slowly happening. A few of you have been asking so I guess it's time to do a post that isn't all sunshine and lollipops.....

 

These windows..... We just can not catch a break. They have really held up progress, nothing has gone off without a hitch. So I will give you a quick run down.....it's a bullet point kind of fill in, full sentences will use too much energy on something that had already been the biggest energy sucker yet.

• 4 weeks ago we were ready for the windows. Some of the windows arrive, with unwanted vision rails...as you know. They are sent back.
• 2 weeks after that some more windows arrive which all have to be sent back because they arrive looking like this.

 

• They return the bulk of the repaired windows over the last week. Excluding the sliding part of the kitchen window, which was dropped on it's way out to us. (Beginning to feel like our windows are actually starring in their very own slapstick comedy)
• Realise that the other part of the kitchen window has been made to slide the wrong way anyway... Has to be sent back.
• Site glazers come out to place the glass in all large windows. I take the day off to clean all the birds nests and poop off the newly polished concrete floor that was supposed to be in a weathertight house. We figure we'll just board the kitchen window up to finally make us weather and bird proof.
• Except.... The have completely forgotten to order one of the large raking triangle windows and the large window above the front door.

 

Thought I'd show you just some of the poop. Haha, you're welcome. So, yep this was all through the house. It was no small job.

We're now looking at having it finished by the end of this week....fingers are crossed, breath is definitely not held.

It has been a bit of a Window nightmare.... I'm sure at the end of all of this we will look back and laugh....haha... Nope, too soon.

It's a funny thing this disappointment because I genuinely want things to go right for not only our own experience but because I like that I have been able to confidently recommend people and businesses from experience to those of you who are also about to build. I have to say, it's not been a great experience because nothing has gone smoothly and the initial stress of having a 30-something-thousand dollar purchase arrive looking second hand was not a nice one.

Two things though,

1. I'm proud to say I haven't cried since the vision rails (yep, still embarrassed about that)
2. As unfortunate as the experience has been, at least Vistalite haven't backed out on us once. They have had many screw ups but they are fronting up to all of them. And the windows we finally have in, we love!

Vistalite are actually responsible for doing all the windows for a large and popular building company and perhaps that hasn't worked in our favour? They would surely be run of their feet with hundreds of orders from them and we're definitely the little guys. I wonder whether it is best to go with a company who deals with quite a few custom builds and not copious amounts of spec houses?

In conclusion. We love the windows we have, we haven't loved the constant problems. To clarify, we are not paying for any of these problems to be rectified. Vistalite has taken care of everything.... That's not to say we haven't lost money with the 5 week drag on to get the windows in. This will definitely be one invoice that will hurt as we pay but I'm sure when we are sitting in our home and looking out those windows....all will be forgotten.

 

Roomie Light

Tina Stephens, our light at the end of the tunnel, our glimmer of hope, when we were scratching our heads...she knew just watt to do. Ohhh! I have so many more puns to make you cringe and make my Father in law clap proudly! But I'll leave it for now....

Tina, is the Creative Director of Roomie, an online professional interior decorating service which has a little something for everyone and in my case, I was drowning when it came to lighting!!!

People say good lighting can make or break a home and when it came to flicking the switch (ok that is the last pun, I promise) on a lighting plan, we were failing miserably. I had a good idea of the aesthetic I was after but placement and clever thinking of 'where and why' was lost on me. Perhaps a downside to doing the build yourself is that you only have room for so many things in your brain. They say you have to build your dream house three times before you get it right....and here we are going for a hole in one. So with that being said, I knew I had to relinquish control of some areas and I KNEW lighting would be it. Now, some of you may be reading this and saying "oh no, Katrina! Don't you realise you can get free lighting plans from chain lighting stores" and I would answer.... Yes, yes I do.... And I did, and they were just never right. If lighting is as important as people say it is then I wanted someone to do it that REALLY got what I was trying to achieve with the style of our home, someone on my wavelength. I didn't want to be limited to what a lighting store had imported this year......plus if I had to look at one more "trendy" light fitting I was going to scream.

Enter Roomie Light....

I gave Tina a very small amount of info to get her started....I wanted a mixture of industrial lighting from Icotraders and natural textured shades to soften it slightly, as few down lights as possible and I also let her know that we weren't big on a LOT of light. Guy is forever turning off lights and switching on lamps.... so with that being said, she wove her magic and presented us with the most comprehensive and well thought out plan, budget and spec sheet than I could have ever hoped for. Seriously, blown away.

 

This is a compilation of ideas Tina put together that were based on the very brief brief. Clever isn't she...... Just you wait.

Meet our lighting plan.... (I hope it's clear enough for you) Each little code matches a light fitting that is on the spec sheet. It was so much fun referencing back and forth and getting a good clear vision of what the room will look like. Tina has made the most of our high ceilings by using up lights in certain areas that will wash light up and across the ceilings in the living room. We will have a few pendant lights in the same area which will be on a different switch. I love that idea, a light room without the harshness of downlights highlighting every single downy eyebrow hair that hasn't been touched in 4months. Curse you non-dimmable downlights and your unforgiving shadows. I am so happy with the plan and could finally breathe out a solid exhale when it came to the lighting. Tina definitely got me, offered fantastic advice and is just really easy to talk to.

To give you an idea of what the product and budget sheet looked like you can check out their Room Service page which offers you a break down of what you get... Look for "shop and budget" down the bottom, you'll see what I mean by well thought out and comprehensive. Roomie light is yet to be officially launched, roll on November. But that won't stop Tina from jumping on a lighting project for you now. Just email her through the Roomie website.

Speaking of Room service.... Obviously lighting isn't the only trick up their sleeve. They have great interior design packages for those of you who need a little inspiration and ahem designer discounts....errrrm bonus! Whether it's just a bit of a kick start and some great ideas of what and where to shop or an all out room makeover that would make your friends think you should be on the The Block next year because you have mad skills. Roomie can and will hook you up. Click here for packages and pricing.

So there you go, my little lighting secret...You don't need to thank me, sharing is caring.

You can follow Tina on Pinterest and like Roomie on Facebook for some daily inspiration.

Thank you Tina!

 

Builders block

 

Oh hey, it's been a while. Things have felt incredibly slow going lately. Most of the work we're doing has no visual impact....super frustrating and not very blog worthy. BUT we did get our concrete floors polished over the weekend!!!! So exciting! Our fantastic neighbour Chris Hendricks from Not Just Coatings did it for us and we are seriously so lucky that he lives next door otherwise we may not have found him!!! He is a proper perfectionist and 'hard worker' doesn't even scratch the surface of his commitment to his work and doing a great job! The concrete looks exactly as we'd hoped. Super natural with just a little aggregate showing in some areas and we actually couldn't be happier!

I tried my best to get some good photos but it turns out photographing concrete and getting it to live up to its 'in real life' potential is a little difficult.

 

There we go, one is in the sun....the other is not. Oh and I forgot to mention, they're not even done yet! This is only stage one, we have to cover the floor with boards to protect them until we're pretty much done with everything and then they're taken off and have two more polishing grits and a sealant buffed in..... Or something like that.

 

 

 

 

 

This weekend marked our first weekend spent staying over in the shed so we could rise nice and early to start work....which also meant Guy could get early morning and dusk surf sessions in and I could sneak away to the brick mill for some vintage goods foraging....Living the dream.

 

 

 

Oh and we threw a BBQ for some of our closest neighbours who have made an effort to visit, help, give and be awesomely neighbourly in general. It was a super fun night and it turns out when we are all together....the drinks flow like a raging river. I had the hugest hangover on Monday, I was thanking my lucky stars it was my day off and I was thinking of my fellow neighbours who weren't quite so lucky while I ate hot chips for breakfast...living the dream? Not so much. All I can say is that the lane would have been harbouring a few sore heads on Monday and it was the Nurse's fault. Welcome to the neighborhood. Eek!!!

In other news, more dramz with the windows but I'll get to that another time. Ugh.

 

Window dilemma

 

 

So, as many of you know from my instagram..... We had a bit of a down day at the house on Saturday. The windows arrived and I was so excited to see them. But as soon as they came out of that truck...my excitement turned into massive disappointment. Things had gone wrong. Our tall skinny master bedroom windows had been cut in two with a big aluminum bar running through them 300mm above the ground and the French doors (one pair which are right near the entrance of the house also had these aluminum bars through them. This is not uncommon, in fact most French doors have them, but it's precisely what I didn't want. The big problem was, it was on our plans....I had noticed this and made sure to check several times that all the doors and large windows were just a big pane of glass "like the front door" but this is where things go wrong. Saying things like "one big pane of glass" "like the front door" isn't enough. You need to use the right words and those words were not in my vocabulary....until Saturday.

 

Vision Bars..... Remember this term if you are a normal customer and not an experienced project manager.... Vision bars!!!! See amazing diagram below.

 

We don't even have kids who are going to run full speed into a window and when we do, I'll buy a little sucky toy and stick it on at their eye level....like my Nana had to do after I ran into her sliders three times as a child. And come to think of it, she HAD vision bars, they don't even work!!!! Actually, I intend to hold those sliding doors with ineffective vision bars responsible for knocking out the area of my brain that could have harboured the term 'vision bars'.

It's a funny thing this house building because we just feel very lucky that we can do this, yes, we work very hard to make it happen but we still feel incredibly grateful that we have the chance to do something like this, so with that being said, complaining about seemingly small things like a bar across some glass may be ridiculous. But in the relevance of our world at the moment. We are living and breathing this project, we practically only see friends at wedding's, 30ths and baby showers these days. I've even had to miss a couple of good friends Hen's weekends. We keep track of every measly dollar during this build so that we don't run over budget and end up with a dream home filled with our blood, sweat and (after Saturday) tears that we can't afford so when things like this happen it can feel like quite a blow.

Glen at Vistalite called this morning to advise me that they will be taking care of the master bedroom windows because what we have on our plans is nothing like what they provided but when it come to the two sets of French doors and the laundry door, because it was on the plans and I didn't say those two stupid words (oh how I wish I'd asked what they were called!) they will replace it all and charge us for the materials only....which will add a painful $3000 to our already huge window bill. To be fair (I always try and see both sides of the story, they were on the plan and I didn't say 'no vision bars') they are trying to meet us halfway.

But, this phone call is where it got very embarrassing, as soon as he said that, the emotion over took me and I could tell I was about to cry. I had to say, "ok thanks Glen, I will have to call you back sorry I'm a little bit upset"....... Great. Only mildly mortified. So Guy has taken it from here...I'm too emotionally invested as this stage, I felt like I did my absolute best at communicating what I wanted and it wasn't quite good enough and it's going to cost us....

 

Oh, that all sounds so doomish and gloomish...But don't worry I'm not gonna beat myself up, listen to sad songs and not get out of my pajamas....I'm gonna live and learn, brush up on my building vocab and post this blog so that those of you who are also building can maybe learn from my mistake.

And if anyone needs their car washed I'm thinking of putting Guy in a speedo at Waikuku beach on Saturday and doing a sexy one for $10.... I'd pay for that.

Need to raise this money somehow right?

 

A roof over our heads

 

 

 

 

The roof is all done and we couldn't be happier with it. Woohoo!! The profile and the chunky spouting work perfectly with the house.....Phew!!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We really needed a good team to get this all done and we definitely had that.

Residential roofing put the roof on for us, they were SO fantastic and we would recommend them to anyone. Well priced and great people. They contracted out the spouting to a great guy called Warren and his cute bearded collie called Wattie.

The edge protection was provided by Pumpjack Scaffolding NZ, it was the most affordable quote we received and they followed through with awesome service.... Nothing was a problem!

Paul at Pumpjack recommended the company for the safety nets.... Funnily enough they are called Safety Nets NZ. Joe was the man we dealt with and I don't think they come much nicer than him. A super great guy who was great to deal with!

 

The roofing profile is ST-963 from Steel&Tube and the colour is Ironsand.