Fabulous freebies

Yay for generous friends who are moving house and giving away their lovely plants (yay to generosity, not to moving)!  Thank you Angela & Eddie!

We are the very lucky recipients of these 8 year old miniature lime and lemon trees as well a frangipani tree and some gorgeous orchids!

Here they are in their new temporary homes, bearing fruit and all...

Thanks again guys and we'll be sure to take great care of them!

Thank you to 'B' too for fetching & potting them x

Plush woolly goodness

I've been keeping an eye out for a floor rug for a little while now.  I wanted something big and comfy for the family room and originally I was looking for colour - something with duck egg blue in it perhaps - but that was next to impossible to find.  When I realised that I went back to my original idea of a white shag rug.

Now I know what you're thinking....white (or ivory as it happens) probably isn't the best colour for a house full of boys but I actually think the texture will help to disguise "every day living" and I also think spot cleaning will work better with a lighter colour (no concerns about fading).  

I found this gorgeous 280 cm x 190 cm shag rug on Grays Online.  It's hand knotted, thick felted wool with a soft 2.5cm pile and I can't wait to sink my toes into it!  

The ivory will also help to balance out some of our darker furniture and the texture will help to add layers to the room and a bit of softness.

Check out the plushy goodness!

This lovely new addition to our home cost $490.  At first I wasn't sure how the price stacked up but after a bit of research I found for pure wool shag rugs of this size you were quite often looking closer to the $900 plus mark.  

I was tossing up between this one and another one that looked so similar but the other was made from polypropylene and even though it was $200 cheaper, the safer natural woollen rug won out in the end.

Plastered!

We have walls!  And how great it looks!

Now we can really feel the room size and everything feels nice and spacious.   I'm so glad we raised the ceiling height to 2590mm as you can really feel the difference.

I also LOVE the amount of natural light that comes in.  It was really important to me to have lots of natural light.  The photo's below have been taken today on quite an overcast day and it's still nice & bright inside.

A few more days yet to be spent on finishing the walls but here is what it's all looking like so far:

And here we have one of our little helpers

Here's our future study nook and wine rack alcove

(wine rack alcove to the right ;) ha ha)

Our little munchkins found a hidey hole behind the wine rack

Looking through the front door

Mud Room / Laundry

Looking down the other hall from our bedroom

Playroom - looking towards the future built in robe

Dad's bedroom

Dad's living area

Looking from hall into Dad's living area

Dad's future kitchen area (fridge alcove just to the left)

Dad's shower (and laundry alcove just to the right)

Garage

Lastly, we noticed through some gyprock that the roof's insulation has not been finished and 'B' also pointed out some pretty terrible looking brickwork at the front of the house.  For our own record, here are some photo's:

In general the top course of bricks has a few wonky bricks, missing mortar and just doesn't look the best

All going to plan, this week should see doors being hung and the skirting and architraves going on.  As well as the gyprock being finished.

Layer upon layer upon layer

Yep, just like the old Sara Lee ad used to say, our home is being put together layer upon layer.  It's looking particularly cosy with the insulation now almost complete.  Just a little more in the roof and it will be done.  Bring on the gyprock!

Standing in Dad's bathroom looking out towards his front door and bedroom

Looking down the hall way towards front door

This is the wall of Dad's bathroom, on the other side is our Living Room.  This is sound proofing - Dad will be happy to know any private business remains private!

This is looking into our mudroom / laundry. Normal insulation on the right and sound proofing on the left.  Our bedroom is on the other side of wall and on the rare chance 'B' gets to have a day sleep after working a night shift, it will be good to know the washing machine won't bother him.

And here's the other side of the wall in our bedroom

Playroom all kitted out

Family Room

And just cause I love our doors, here they are again :P

Have a great long weekend everyone!

Hellooooo gorgeous!

So chuffed to see our lovely clean house today!  What a difference it makes to see clean bricks.  I'll let the pictures do the talking! (Click on the picture to see a larger version)

Here's a reminder of what our house looked like prior to the spruce up

Interesting how different the bricks look in different light. Below is a pretty true reflection.

Stoked to report there's no 2 tone mortar, just needed a bit longer to dry

What 2 tone?

And here's the back view!  

Don't mind the quagmire!

At least I come prepared now!

Here's our busy little cul-de-sac...

Here's hoping security is beefed up just a tad more over the 5 day long weekend!

Cause no one would ever be able to squeeze through here or anything!  (This is our neighbour's house who is also building an Eden Brae home so there is 1 fence around both our properties.)  

Apparently, on the first day back after the long weekend, Eden Brae go around all the homes to see if / what has been vandalised :(

Fingers crossed we're spared!