Frame now finally done. About time!

Our frame was finished this week. We were expecting that things would be a bit slower at this busy time of year, but it has been a blow to see our neighbour's house moving along at a cracking pace. I am trying to ignore all the things he's getting done, like roof (although he went colourbond, so quicker), plumbing, guttering and now bricks :( he works for them so I guess he has the advantage!
They cannot give us an idea of brickwork commencement, not until next year (at least LOL!). Anyway, here's the latest pictures....we took the kids and my mother in law up there last Sunday to have a look, so the extra bits of reinforcement timber which are criss crossed through some of the pictures are now gone as all the steel strips have gone in now.

View from lounge room window:


Jade near lounge room doorway, across the "hallway" is Alicia's room:


From the backyard, L to R is Andrew's room, then Cheyenne's Room, and then Jade's:


The front...we have main bedroom to the far left, then Ryan's room, then lounge room:

I will get some pics of bathroom, kitchen/dine, rumpus etc now that all the bits of timber are gone.

With the wrong window saga, it turns out that we have the right ones as our upgraded crosses are stuck on. I don't know whether to be relieved or not, I am slightly alarmed I am paying $1250 for stickers! Oh well, if they look good and last then that's all that matters I guess.

I probably won't get a chance to update before Christmas as we're quite busy and I guess nothing will happen with the house at this stage anyway. So Merry Christmas everyone....hope you all have an enjoyable, relaxing day :)

Tamsin :)

Frame almost complete

I am not sure why ours took so long, everyone else's took a couple of days :/ Anyway, I really hoped to not whinge again, it seems to be all I am doing about this whole building saga. As of yesterday we still had the roof being finished (well I hope it was being finished...I haven't been there today to check). It's been over a week, and it's kind of shattered the idea of having any brickwork done by Christmas, as everyone will be on holidays soon.
I sent an email on Wednesday morning, and I am yet to hear an answer on whether we are scheduled to have brickwork begin before Christmas. It's now been two days so I might be needing to follow up the lack of response again.
We did hear back about our concerns regarding dirt which wasn't removed (which we had paid $1400 for!!) and they are going to credit our account. Now I am annoyed about the $1250 I paid for upgraded windows, and I got standard ones :( I only got a few upgrades for the facade, the windows, the cut off eaves, and the panel lift roller door. I don't have the patience to wait for them to order new ones, get them fitted, and then have the brickwork consequently put off until goodness knows when.
I will update with some photos when I get the chance, and I would like to take some more, however it's bucketting down rain all day according to the BOM....actually quite fitting for my whinging pom post today ;p

Framework begins!

Yay! I still haven't heard anything from the builders, but at least there is action. We noticed last night there was timber around the edges of the slab, so we thought that it may be soon, but what a surprise I got when I drove up there early this afternoon and most of the upper level had been done! At the rate they are moving we are thinking the whole frame will be done by knock off Friday!

Photos:




After a disheartening start to the week, I am glad they've started something. I never thought that building a house could be so stressful and after so many disappointments and lengthy unexplained delays by the builder I was just hoping that something could go to plan!
The kids, who are mostly over driving up to look at the "stupid block" now can't wait to check out where their bedrooms are going to be. Jade is very concerned over the size of her room, she wants to get up there straight after school tomorrow!!
Alicia has been suffering with chicken pox since Sunday, and Andrew has been in hospital again since Saturday (asthma), so it's a bit of excitement for them too. We're all suffering from cabin fever here!

Nothing happening....

Although this has become the general feeling for us with this whole building experience, so nothing new! We signed our contract in July 07, and I never dreamed that we'd still be sitting here now waiting for our house, with only a slab poured and that's it!
Well, the meeting with the contracts manager has turned over nothing to this date. It's been two and a half weeks, with an email reminder last Tuesday from me. This was promptly answered, but only to tell me that he hasn't been able to solve any of our issues! I also wanted to know when the framework was going to start, but he still hasn't got back to me on that one either.
I asked for a rough idea of when our house will be ready, but apparently he can't give me any idea here either...not until the kitchen goes in. We haven't even though about the kitchen at this point, we are still waiting for a frame!
So, unfortunately nothing to report other than us being left mighty annoyed and disheartened by our treatment, yet again :/