Progress too slow to write about

 Tony, standing in front of the doorway to the front hall and the pantry. You can see the entry to the rear hallway to the left.

The kitchen. The living room.

T

My dad, standing in the front door.

Hi! The progress thus far has been so slow, and so painful, that I couldn't even bear writing about it. However, having been inspired reading 'Building the Dream in Eynesbury', I thought I'd give everyone an update.
Let's see. We have a frame, roof, bricks. We have plaster (done by our brother-in-law, in less than a week.) We have timber floors (130mm Blackbutt, acclimatised about 2 weeks on site, installed in one week by our flooring contractor, as at the time of signing contracts Greybox told us they no longer installed timber floors. They've since changed their position on this!). We have scribbles on the ceiling where most of our downlights are (still missing some marks). We also JUST RECEIVED a copy of our final electrical plan, which was missing several powerpoints that we had requested (including one near the vanity in the ensuite, an obvious one!), and at the end of the island bench. Also, the elec plan doesn't currently include the locations of the light switches. And, the IXLtastic noted for the ensuite lists a two-light fan, not a four light. Well, considering the size of our ensuite, you would have thought a four light would again be obvious. I've checked our specs, and all it says is 'required', so I'm sure we're going to have a fight on our hands.
We had a similar situation with the front door, which has four glass panels in it, and the front sidelight, both of which are clear. As you'd expect, we asked for frosted. (Who wants clear glass in their front door!?) However, silly us, all it says on our specifications is "required", so it's their word against ours. And in that situation, guess who wins? Not us!
Other issues? When the 'building designer', Tony from Acquire Designs, drew up our plans, he neglected to factor the brick count in to the placement of the windows, front door, and rear doors. So, in order to avoid some ugly brick cuts, the brickie 'spaced out' the bricks, meaning way more mortar between each brick. Looks very yucky. In addition, the brick joints (mortar) on the rear of the garage are rolled (a groove in them), not flush, as we requested. Why? Someone from Greybox told the brickie to ignore what was written on the plans, because 'Greybox does them all rolled now'. Thanks for that. Fortunately Tony (my husband) visited the site when the brickie was completing the garage, and BEFORE he started on the rest of the house, so he instructed him to do the rest of the house with flush joints.
Oh, and we also had yet another issue with the order for our plumbing fixtures (taps and spouts), (we had several mix ups to begin with) that required me taking another day off work, and two more trips to Reece, before we got it all sorted out.
Now, on to the serious oversight, that makes me question Greybox's competency. About three weeks ago, we visited the site to find that the brickie had cleaned the bricks... all good... until we went into the garage and discovered a huge pool of water at the back, seeping into the rear wall where plaster will be installed. Yes, the garage slab has been installed with a 'negative' slope, towards the back wall! A particularly amazing feat, especially given that our block actually has a 600mm fall from the front of the block to the rear, meaning that it would have been no effort at all to actually make the slab 'fall' towards the garage door, so any water could drain properly. After 3 weeks of chasing Anthony, he's let us know that the garage slab will have to be dug up and replaced. Nice.
AND, last but not least, he doesn't think we'll be in before Christmas! He's blaming this on the fact that we did our own plastering, flooring, and painting, however, by our estimation this would have only added two weeks to the length of the job. What happened to the Oct 2nd completion date? Well, since neither the start date nor completion date have ever been confirmed in writing (despite repeated written requests), guess no one actually knows when our house is officially supposed to be completed! Is this conducting work in "a competent manner and to a professional standard" (as per the Building Commission's requirements? I think not! We'll see what BACV has to say. Blah!
By the way, if anyone wants to call me directly and chat about my experiences with Greybox, and some things to look out for, feel free: Carolyn @ 0417 346 847.

The house is taking shape

We visited the block over the weekend- the front timber windows have been installed, and the roof trusses are in. Unfortunately, the window frames (sashes) are not as wide as we would have liked, despite providing Greybox with measurements, photos of similarly wide-sashed frames, and having a thicker sash indicated on the plans. Note to anyone building: if it's not on the list of specifications included with your contract, or as a post-contract variation, technically, the builder is not obligated to build it! Even if it's on the plans, the specs in the contract take precedence. (Trust me, I've had many lengthy convos with Building Advice and Conciliation Victoria!)
(Sorry about the shadows in the photos, not ideal for viewing!)

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.)