Hot Days Ahead...

...but we don't mind so much, cos our Straw Bale House is nice and cool. 

It's a hot and windy 36C in Melbourne today and for those lucky enough to be working inside the house, it was rather pleasant.  For the rest of us in the sun, not so great.  I was up on the scaff painting more eaves... hot, damn hot!  I did enjoy a cat nap on N&F's cushy carpet after exhausting myself outside tho.

MOTH is on light duties only.  Still unable to drive and not quite steady on his feet, he was on routing duties only.

AC and Nama made the most of the comfortable temperature inside and continued on with painting duties.

Further delays...

Unfortunately MOTH has fallen ill and therefore works have fallen behind on the house.  Delays from suppliers is also holding us back, so Christmas 2012 in our new house will not be happening.

But we must go on without MOTH so the girls were on the job this weekend, sanding and painting the eaves... working hard to finish off the outside jobs so the remaining scaff can be taken away.

Water proofing AC's bathroom



Study/Lounge now plastered






Fuzzy mowing on the trusty tractor

  

Doors ready to be hung





Still painting...

Now that my shoulder tendon has recovered somewhat from the damage incurred during my last spell of painting, I'm back on deck, or in this case, the roof, to paint more eaves... woo hoo

More interesting news however, the plaster/painting is coming along in leaps and bounds.  Here's the kitchen/meals from 2 angles.

 

Nama & Fuzzy's vinyl flooring was laid this week and they've finished installing the cabinet and other fixtures in the bathroom.  Fuzzy's out of the shower BTW.

The work room has a hard floor for Nama's sewing area and the rest will be carpeted for Fuzzy's delicate tootsies.

AC who hasn't been too well lately is back on the job too, but has been put on light duties... get it?

Splash of Paint...

We're getting to the serious end of business here folks... and it's all about the painting.  As those of you who know us are aware, we were hoping to be moving in for Christmas last year... and right now we're so close to getting it on for this Christmas!  pray for us peoples... we simply don't have enough painting hands and Nama is doing her very best.

In the meantime, MOTH has built the bath hob and resumed fitting eave boards... only a few left to do my sweet...

Fuzzy loves his newly installed shower so much we couldn't get him out of it...

K1 came along to do some work today but spent more time posing for photos & taking selfies...

This photo shows you how the painted plaster wall (with black bracket) matches quite beautifully with the painted strawbale wall.  Nama & Fuzzy have decided to paint all their walls and discovered Natural Paint by Murobond, a product suitable for earth rendered walls.  Containing fresh milk, casein, egg white, linseed oil and a number of other ingredients, it adheres nicely while still allowing the walls to breath. See 'Fitout' post 13/09/2012 for comparison photo titled 'Upstairs'.  LOTH is now reconsidering her position on painting the strawbale walls!

Hic... the wagon wheel

I've outdone myself peoples... today I picked up my craftiest eBay purchase - and what a beauty.  You may recall from the previous post that I mentioned a light fitting?  Well, it's gonna be made from this...

... and what an amusing time I had loading it into my small car... the only way possible being via the front passenger door, past the gear shift which had to be moved to the lowest posi, over the fully reclined driver's seat and wedged behind with the seat returned to its correct position.  Fortunately, it sat there happily for the trip home but getting it out again was quite tricky.

Now for the really fun part... making the light fitting.  Again, stay tuned.

We're getting plastered...

The house is now two thirds plastered and looking great. While the inside scaff was in place to fit the plaster (see right photo), we also painted the walls our chosen colour - Dulux Buff half strength.  At the same time, the powered window winders were fitted to the two clerestory windows that open in that central area.  The hanging chain is waiting for the light fitting that we're creating as a group... stay tuned.

Moth & Fuzzy have been installing shower bases, mini LED lights in the stairwells and other bits and bobs.

Fit out continues as deliveries arrive and the ever so helpful chippies produce door frames & instal the doors for us.

And my ultimate purchase so far... the vanity for our powder room... off eBay... for a cool $62.  Thanks MOTH and Ian for taking the time to dismantle the beast from its former home and deliver to the pantry on Friday night :)

Ten days since workplace accident...

Ooops... Fuzzy had a rotten time last week after coming off worse following an altercation with the table saw.  After being sent home three times from the local public hospital, he finally had his pinky operated on Friday.

Here is Fuzzy recuperating in his favourite chair...

Fuzzy has promised to be more careful... he might not be so lucky next time!

Painting...

As I suspected, Nama has started painting her bedroom, with AC's help.  Here they are on the job... obviously having way too much fun!

 

In the meantime, plastering continues in AC's penthouse,

  

and MOTH is up on the roof fitting cladding to the wall with the clerestory windows. 

Finally, here is our latest guest, April, who is staying with us for a couple of weeks while her dad, our sparky, is away on holidays.  I think she's quite enjoying the change of scenery, but perhaps missing her family somewhat.  Obviously wanting more attention, she jumped on my back and nudged me with her horns several times in the backside today as I was wandering about taking photographs.  She's very friendly tho... we will miss her when she goes home. 

Scaffold be gone...

Celebrations... most of the scaff was taken away this week... and we are so relieved.  It has been a huge financial burden over the past 12 months or so... and doesn't the house look so much purdier without it?

We've retained just a small section of scaff on the east side to retain access to the roof and finish off eaves and so on down that side of the house.

Fitout...

It's all happening folks... the plumber is finishing off the roughing-in and same for the sparky, all the while the plasterer has started and from what I hear, Nama & Fuzzy's end of the house is all but ready to be painted. 

Most of us have decided that we'll leave the internal rendered walls natural but wash them with a lime based milky mixture to contain the dust.  At this stage, only K2 is painting his bedroom walls an actual colour.

Upstairs

Downstairs



Downstairs in the communal meals area
facing the above right rooms

Meanwhile, MOTH and Fuzzy are loading up walls, floors and everything in between with insulation batts and working on other inside jobs, while I continue painting eaves and AC repairs cracks in the outside render before the scaffolding goes.

Did I tell you about the elephant in the room?  ... it's hangin' out with our biggest fan!

We're so proud of K1... she's taken up pole dancing.

The Big Clean Up...

As much as we cleaned up as we went along, thanks mostly to Nama & Fuzzy who put in the hours during the week, there's still a heap of mud and muck on the floors and splattered render to be removed from doors, windows and woodwork. 

Nama had the idea to put large sheets of plastic and/or fabric on the floors to catch as much of the muck as possible during the rendering process and this was quite effective but didn't cover everything.  The boys decided to just gather it all up and toss it over the balcony.

... just deferring the real clean up to later I suppose...

There's also quite a bit of sponging to be done on the internal walls, even tho they're now completely dry... and that makes the work 100 times harder on the shoulders.  All very necessary as the trowel marks need to be removed so the walls look oh so pretty.

Rendering is complete...

The final coat of inside render was applied on the weekend.  The mosh pit got so bad the mixing space had to be moved.  The first day it rained non stop and the outside personnel were not happy about working with Lime in these conditions. 

Nonetheless, the job was completed before lunch on the second day and the rendering crew got to go home early.  Here we farewelled the boys and their machinery for the last time...

But the day didn't end there for everybody else.  The hard-working hard plasterers were doing their thing inside and the loungeroom (see earlier pics in post 22 July - internal walls with blueboard sides were first covered in fine chicken wire) was completely rendered and came up a treat.

Paul and his trusty trowel finished off the door frames (to accommodate skirting boards) beautifully.    Here's AC and Paul trowelling and sponging together...

Now the walls just need to be sponged off to make them nice and smooth, but as they're still quite wet, we'll have to wait a few days before we can get stuck into that.

Next job... the big clean up... and it'll be massive!

PS:  we're all very happy our rendering days are over !!!