Ya know, if it wasn’t for the date on this computer I wouldn’t know what day it is.

Yes we have been that busy, that exhausted and now, sickly – ah the price you pay for burning the candle at both ends…

So, we are still sleeping in the house J - I knew there would be no getting Michael back into the caravan – and no complaints from me or the kids either.

But still there is not much more furniture in here – just a couple of (empty) sets of drawers and the dining table.  Just too tired to move more in – and most of it needs painting to bring it into this ‘new home’ colour scheme – so that is another factor – we will get there…

But we are on a mission to be prepared to move much more ‘stuff’ in this coming weekend – the outlaws are on their way over to help us again J – so rain or shine – we will at least have cooking supplies, foodstuffs and clothes in I reckon – and crafty goodness J - and a head start on some furniture too probably.  Can’t wait!

There is still the bug factor too as to why we haven’t rushed to move in – I have been vacuuming every second/third day – the whole house! – and it is so much easier to vacuum empty floors than know the lil’ critters are hiding behind our lovely furniture!  This is Plan C – intimidation!  I figure if we move in, us (being about a gazillion times bigger than them) will scare them out!!  Ha, take that booklice/barklice – be ye gone!!!

We were so close to nuking them – bought the flea bombs and everything – but with the worldwide evidence always coming back to chemicals are never guaranteed, usually only work ‘so-so’ and getting the humidity down is a 100% - well, we decided to wait it out a bit longer – and do the scare tactic too.  Hey, maybe if we dress up for Halloween, that will really scare them out…worth a shot anyway – and will at least be fun to try J.

Anyway, here is why we are so tired:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Paving has started!!  And take note of this lovely selection of colours (yes, all from the salvage yard) – it will help explain the ‘character’ of paving patterns ;-).

My honey emailed me a photo at work last Tuesday lunchtime:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And by Friday afternoon he had got to here:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wow, so good!!

My contribution has been carrying plenty of pavers across before and after work.  And the kids have carried quite a few too.  Man, they are HEAVY!!!  I can carry a max. of 5 – so I figured they must weigh at least a couple of kilos each (concrete pavers they are) – but I decided to weigh one on my kitchen scales – a quarter piece weighed approx. 1.3kg!!!!  That makes a full paver about 5kg – five point zero kilograms EACH.  Darn, darn, darn heavy in any language!!! 

Hey, just for fun, let’s do the math.  There are 25 pavers per square meter – that’s 125kg lifted, carried and placed per square meter, right?  We have 210m² to do the verandah – so (work with me here) 125 x 210 = too bloody much = we are loco, crazy, MAD!!!

Big storm last night.  Big, ol’ windy and rainy storm.

So - we - slept - in - the - house J.

Yay us. 

Very warm J.  And quiet J.

Time for a catch-up post.  It has been some time after all…

It’s been some hard times…

It’s been one of those times when I have had to take some time to work it all out (again!). 

It’s been a time when we have taken time to celebrate the lives of people we have loved and admired.

I have attended three memorial services in 3 weeks and another to come next week.  It has been hard, that is for sure, and I have been a bit off-kilter and I had to search hard to find my answers to get back on a bit of a more even keel. 

It was the words, “Celebrate a life well-lived” that made sense to me eventually ­last week.  The memorial services all celebrated lives well-lived, and I realised that the legacy of the wonderful people who had passed is that we can celebrate our lives by living well now, by celebrating life every day that we are given and most of all, by celebrating the things that are important to us and that help the world be a better place – family, friends, the environment - our hopes and dreams.

So, in a very low key, quiet and somewhat difficult way we are celebrating.  We are celebrating living life.  And the house passing the shire inspection.  Most of all - we are celebrating our family and friends and their contributions to our lives.

When I took a day off work to try and clear my head a bit, I loved that I could spend it working alongside Michael and have that time to work things out a bit. 

He got the skirting boards all finished – sanding them (recycled jarrah of course), coating with wood oil and then drilling and nailing them on.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

He also fixed the shelving in our linen cupboard – again recycled.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And he came up with the brilliant idea to use the overhead cupboards from our recycled jarrah kitchen in the pantry – don’t they look stunning?!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(And see the chopping board he made from some off cuts of jarrah floorboards?  So, so clever and beautiful!)

He has also filled and painted plenty of doors (*all* done now).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Outside, he has patched render and secured copper pipes.

And he has cleaned the house from top to bottom - all by himself - hours and hours of windows, moving every little and big thing out, scrubbing tiles on his hands and knees today:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(while I have been at work, or walking to clear my head, or keeping to myself, or with my family saying goodbye or sleeping to aid healing).

So now we are taking the time to quietly celebrate.  Quietly, not raucously (I hope that will come too!) – but this adventure is worth celebrating and the people we have shared it with are certainly worth celebrating too!

Cheers!!  We have finished!!!

(Inside at least, almostly…let the adventure continue…)

Well…we have gone and done it!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These pages are with the Shire.

And it feels good!!!

Now to finish our home!

This girl loves her hot water!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks Honey!!!

Our kindy girl has to bring in a photo today, here’s her topic: “The 3 Little Pigs have interesting houses…What is your house made out of?”

At least ours will withstand a huffing and a puffing wolf!  LOL.

Some lovely progress last week.
My honey has been up a ladder:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So we could have this!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 And the teenager could have his “way cool” light too:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Which goes from that, to this!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Definitely speccy!

And the wonderful Jeff the Joiner brought over our bathroom vanity top – so gorgeous as always. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I can’t wait until the bathroom is finished – I’ve got decorating plans!!

But before then, I am now onto Plan B for the bugs:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is borax – a 'natural' bug killer, it is a salt and dries them out – people say it works…I have been doing some more research...because I needed to.   We returned Kenny (the hire dehumidifier) as he had been here 3+ weeks and we thought it was time.  We knew the bugs weren’t fully gone, but we thought we would see where they were at, and some websites say the life cycle can be up to 100 days L.  Now I am not sure if it was a good idea to return Kenny because we had a few days of population explosion – so we started Plan B.  There sure are plenty of dead bodies again, but still too many still moving around too L.  I will leave the borax out for another week or so, by which time we will actually be finished! 

Yes, finished-owner-building!!  August 9^th is the day – the day our building permit expires.

It is exciting to be typing that J – but we won’t be moving into our home straight away – for the bug reason and because we will need to ‘finish’ off some other things anyway some painting (maybe we will do it, and maybe we will wait); shelving in the cupboards, paving the verandah, putting in the clothes line, getting the energy to actually move all our furniture...  So we will have some time after we are ‘finished’ to empty out the house completely of the cardboard, tools and bits that are cluttering it up and then, give it a good, sparkling clean and really see what the bugs are doing (maybe by removing the cardboard, which is a potential food source, we will be in a position to kill them off – maybe get the humidity right down for another 3 week spell???, maybe Plan C??? – actually not sure I have a plan C yet…)

But of course, we really want to be moving in!!!