Day 1

Well today the site was excavated.  Woo hoo!!!!!

We had the land cut to the back boundary today.  It is very exciting.  We also have a fence now as well.  We decided to level the whole block while they were there today to save angst and money further down the track.  We also want a flat back yard.  This meant that there was a little more fill to get rid of but only 70 tonne - so not too much in building terms.  More money though, :(  although we did get a good deal.

This is looking to the back of the block.  You can just see another blogger's house in the background.  Thigee are you there? :)  Hello sort of neighbour.

This is from the back of our block looking towards our rain garden.


We have been busy with our choices.  We have changed our mind about our bathroom tiles and this has been giving us some grief (along with Maria (from the World of Tiles) some grief too - although she has been totally professional and wonderful).  We have decided to treat all 3 bathrooms as different identities as they all fulfil different needs.  We have decided to have the mirror for the whole length of the wall and our feature tile (very special feature tile) running the length underneath along with being in the shower niche.  The tile going over the bath is the same for both bathrooms.

The bath tile:

This will be laid vertically over both baths.  The feature tile in the ensuite will be:

All wall tiles will be a rectified white porcelain tile and the floors will be the original charcoal ceramic tile.

The feature tile in the shower niche in the main bathroom is:

Their feature tile is essentially the bath tile in a mosaic pattern.


The feature tile in the downstairs bathroom will be on the wall as you walk in (in the shower and behind the toilet.  This is essentially the white option of the bath feature tile for the upstairs bathrooms.

The tile in the shower niche for the downstairs bathroom is:

Our kitchen splashback tile which we love every time we see it.  :)

The laundry splashback tile (which we will be getting extras so that when we eventually fit out our laundry we can have it running the whole length)

We are still trying to decide on our upgrades to our stairs.  The first quote was a bit scary.  So now we need to decide what we will cut.  We are definitely having the stainless steel balusters and the stained timber handrail, however the bottom red gum step will probably have to go :(    What do we want more... is what it came down to.

We have also done the electrical plan and are happy with our compromises there.  We have decided not to have downlights everywhere downstairs..... just in some feature areas.  We have also submitted our plan for the kitchen design and we are now just waiting to find out how much more it's going to cost.

We are very excited and can't wait for our dream home to be built.

Ready........ Set........ GO!!!!!!

We have today, received notification of the first progress payment being made to the builder.  This is it!  Engineering drawings almost done.  We have almost finished the selections.  We are all very excited and worried simultaneously.

We are hoping to start this month.  Fingers crossed.

We have been looking at stairs.  We had no idea how many options or choices there were available.  We think we have decided on our final choice, however, of course, it's an upgrade.

We have changed our mind from ceramic tiles for the bathroom / laundry floor to glazed porcelain.  They look amazing and we'll just need to get some rubber backed mats.  They will also be used for the laundry splashback.  We still love our feature tile.

We have started to look at all of the upgrades that we want............ Some difficult choices will need to be made although we have saved some money by opting for tiles as the splashback.  We have also checked the quote for our beautiful timber floors and discovered that it was cheaper than we had planned.  We have decided to go with Timber Floors at Smithfield.  We are having hardwood 100m Red Gum Timber floors sitting on hardwood battens.

It will look amazing on the bottom floor and is also one of the most hard wearing timbers (kids and dogs).  This timber also is well suited to The Ponds area due to the levels of humidity and changes in temperature particularly in summer.  We have been very happy with the service we have received and if you want more details as in contact or prices quoted to us, please pm us.

We have also pretty much chosen our benchtops.  We are going with white shimmer Caesarstone in the kitchen and night sky Caesarstone in the bathrooms.  It is all really starting to come together........ finally :)

We are getting more excited every day and can't wait to see our dream come true.

The stairs we like, but with no timber stained baluster top.



The Red Gum Floor to the Entry, Foyer, Hall, Meals, Family, Kitchen & Pantry.