We have been FRAMED! We didn't do it.... I swear... :)

Ok..... We are of course referring to the house being framed.  The carpenters have been hard at work all through the school holidays with regular drive by's from us and regular bike rides (just to see what they are doing now) from Tristan - the aspiring builder.

There were only two blokes working on the house, however they did an amazing job even in some difficult weather conditions.  We were a bit worried they were going to be blown off the top storey in that horrific wind last week... but they weren't.

Our frame has been completed as you will be able to see.  Our windows are in.  Our bricks are delivered.  Our cement and sand is there as well.  The plumber is coming tomorrow (Monday) to do the pipes roughing in.  The bricklayer will be there tomorrow doing his termite protection thing.  (This is all hinging, of course, on the rain staying away).  The bricklayer and his team will then be back on Tuesday to start bricking.  WOO HOOOO!!!

All of the upgrades / changes / finer details have now been chosen or sorted.  Jason has been fantastic and assisted us in every way possible over the last few months.  Dean (our SS) has also been excellent and made some fantastic suggestions that we have taken on board.  This has included (just in case people are reading this before they start building) a bulkhead to the foyer to assist in giving the foyer the 'WOW factor' we are after.  This is in addition to recommending that we install downlights in our family / kitchen / dining area.  This was something that Phil had been seesawing about since we started looking at lights.  So... we are now having down lights in this area.

We also picked up an error on our part.  We had increased the height of the front door previously and we had thought that we had increased all other things.... and we did... except the bulkhead (2 metres from the front door) and door into the front lounge room.

We are having 9 foot ceilings (2700mm) downstairs and the bulkhead from the foyer into the stair area was at 2.1m.  Luckily we picked this up at this stage in the process and it's not too expensive to fix up.  So we then thought we should increase the size of the lounge room doors and also lifted up the display niche - so they will all now be the same height in the foyer area.

Some of our upgrades include:
* Smeg 900mm freestanding oven (my mother's day present :) )
* Amazingly beautiful tiles from DiLorenzo (my ensuite feature tile was my birthday present)
* Square set cornices for the downstairs areas (except the laundry)
* Laundry fit out
* Fancy door to the pantry
* Lighting and electrical upgrades (all those downlights)
* Front door and lock upgrade
* Upgraded staircase (stainless steel balusters, spotted gum bottom step (in line with the timber floor we are now having) and maple handrail)
* Tiling to the ceiling in the powder room
* Extra width to all of the bathroom vanities and drawers added as well
* Kitchen upgrades (including under mount sink, additional pot drawers, another row of overhead cupboards, bulkhead, microwave tower and a hidewaway deluxe pull out bin)

If you are interested in costs or why we've chosen these, please private message us and we will be happy to provide further details.

Now for the pictures.

Looking towards our front door with the balcony roof on. 

Looking from across the road.  You can see the bricks that have been delivered in the front yard.  

Looking from our porch through to the back of our house.  In the foreground are our Blue Steel Flash bricks.  

We are getting so excited watching our house take shape.  Phil is meeting the plumber on site tomorrow morning at 7am so he will be getting some 'inside' photos.  This journey is so exciting.