More photos of the frame...

Read the post before this as well. Here are some more groovy photos...
David the carpenter, in the family room, looking over rear alfresco area. (L) Dining room window (R)

above: the laundry (L) and looking out to what will be the garage/back hallway (R)

rear towards alfresco

side rear angled towards alfresco

And next comes the roof trusses, tomorrow!

Taking shape!

dining room window

It's beginning to take shape! I visited the site today, met the carpenters (and brought them some refreshments, non-alcoholic of course!), and walked through the framed house. Oddly enough, the rooms actually *do* feel larger now that the frame is there, and you get a sense of proportion of the rooms. Everything feels pretty good, except: the main toilet, which seems to be about the size of a shoebox, and the 'tv nook', which is large enough to contain a few bunk beds. And a tv. Gladly enough, the toilet in the ensuite is big-ola. I think I'll be spending a lot of time in there... lol. Some of our timber windows were there too, and they are gorgeous. That's something I forgot to mention- the window sizes. The holes in the walls for them are HUGE. That should be pretty nice- lots of light. Lucky Tony is a window cleaner!
family room / dining room - side of house

Framed Photos

OK, not so clever title! Here are the photos of the slab with the frame 'mapped out'. You can see photos of the timber and trusses required. These will form the skeleton of our house. Standing inside the wooden 2x4s and 2x10s, the rooms still feel small to me. But Tony feels they're pretty big! (The old glass half full, half empty phenomenon I guess.) Here are some photos of our continued progress. Looking forward to enjoying these sunsets from our front verandah!

Abi's room (photo to left).   In the bathroom.

 That's Tony, standing in the study.

What's a picture without a frame?

Shayne, the construction manager, left us a message yesterday that the frame is going up this week, and should be completed by Saturday. Everyone who's built says, 'you'll be amazed at how quickly the frame goes up' and also, that we should get a much better 'feel' for the size of the rooms once the frame is in place. Can't wait!

We have slab!

God is good! All the time!
We finally have a slab, and a beautiful one at that. (Well, I think so.)
Bizarrely, the house seems much smaller than what we anticipated, however friends have commented that this is quite common- because your eye has no stopping point or something?!
However, I got out my measuring tape and measured, and it seems pretty accurate vs. the plan. Well, maybe 10mm out, but then I doubt my measuring is that accurate.
The back and side yards are much smaller than we thought, or at least it seems so... thanks to our oh so lovely tree at the front, which pushed the building envelope back. Oh well.
And, the depth of the slab at the back is 850mm, which means the house as a whole is quite elevated. Which is not a bad thing- should look good, and also give a good view of the forest at the back.
Here's Luka, running across the slab, in what will be the front bedroom.

And here's Abi, writing her name on the slab! For the archaeologists to find in 1000 years...

Let's play spot the difference...

18/03/2010
View from the rear (north east) aspect of the block.




























And here's the same view from the 4th of April, 2010. Hmmm... it's cloudier?

Maple syrup with those waffles?

We have the waffles (big styrofoam blocks) which form the basis of the waffle slab, and the wire meshing that stabilises the concrete. We were promised that the slab would actually be poured before Easter... and as we've come to start expecting, this did not materialize! So we are assuming (in the absence of anyone from the builder actually updating us) that the slab will be poured this week... maybe even tomorrow?
This is the view from outside our ensuite, looking into the bathroom. Our bedroom is in front of that (going away from you). To the left you see some of the pipes for the kitchen.

Abi, standing outside what would be the living room. (North side of the house.) The pipes in the background are the main bathroom and laundry.

The view from the back verandah (alfresco area) into the living room. Picture timber sliding doors at the back of the deck.

We have pipes!

The pipes have been laid in for water in the house. It's interesting to walk amongst them and imagine where the rooms are. We're hoping this means the slab will be laid soon. Pipes are in on Tuesday 16 March, supervisor estimates the slab should be in Friday.

This is Abi, standing in the main bathroom.

Not only do we have pipes, but we have rock! We spoke to a couple of guys who were digging out a block a few houses down (which had many large piles of large rocks). They said that it looked like we had just about 1 cubic metre of rock, which is the 'tipping point' for getting charged for excessive rock. No word from the builder yet as to their opinion! We put a $10K allowance in the contract just in case, however we don't want to use too much of that, as there have been a number of 'necessary' variations (most of which, unforeseen by us, but foreseeable by the builder) which we'll need that stash for. (These include steps from the garage to account for a 600mm fall towards the back of the block, and having to move the sewer point because it was under the garage site.)