Mud Rooms

Mud Rooms.  Got one? Need one? Want one?  Or are you wondering what on earth I'm on about?

Mud Rooms seem to be more of an American thang but I think they're starting to feature over here in Australia a little more.  Or is that just what I'm noticing?

Mud Rooms separate the inside from the outside and provide a spot for your coats, bags, shoes, dog leashes, keys and any other bits & bobs.  Our new house will have one right next to the laundry and will be the spot where we enter the house after parking in the garage.

Here's a photo taken from one of the Eden Brae display homes to pretty much show just what ours will look like: 

 

And here are some great ideas for mudrooms I've come across. 

Starting with this one which is my favourite. Very organised, functional, simple yet stylish.  I love the storage seat!  Great to hide the boys shoes in and a spot to plonk the boys on while I put their shoes on!  Boxes hide all the mess.  Love it!



Then we have the following 2 which appear to have a 'locker' for each family member.  Very organised and functional, though you'd need to be a little more tidy with these ones, having everything on display!





Here's another one.  Neat, simple and tidy.



And lastly, this cute little one was put together by Maillardville Manor and is only 5 x 4 foot small big.  Not quite the look I'm after but I do like the way she's used the space and I particularly love the monogram on the mirror.  Handy spot to have a mirror really.  And check out those fold up hooks from Ikea under the mirror!  Great if space is limited.






So there you go, a few ideas on mudrooms.  What does yours look like?

Boy's Bedroom Ideas

A few boys bedrooms I've been inspired by...

In this one I love the bold blue wall and white furniture

 

 In the 2 below, similar thing again - bold colours teamed with white furniture

 I love the idea of using the space around windows as well as the window seat!

Based on these pictures, I think it's safe to say I'm going to try for a similar look.  Fresh and clean looking with some bold colours and not too over the top with a 'theme'.

For my little guy who is 4, I'm thinking the following.....

Quite a while ago I saw a fabulous rocket ship wall decal on a friends facebook page and just had to have it for my eldest son's big boy bedroom in the new house.  We've also got it in white like the picture below and will be having a very similar coloured feature wall (Regatta by Bristol) in his bedroom.  The decals can be found at My Munchkin Home

I've bought the following bedding from Cotton Box.  I bought the one below as shown including red sheets and turquoise world cushion.

I also bought the striped doona cover and pillow slip on below set as I figure the same red sheets above will suit and it's always nice to have a spare set.

For window treatments, I'm thinking of white plantation shutters like these to keep in line with the fresh, clean lines I'm after.  Though jury is still out as curtains might be nicer and more whimsical in a kid's bedroom if you know what I mean?

Currently the bulk of the bedroom furniture we have is in oak but I just bought a King Single Bed with a trundle underneath from ebay which I plan on sanding back and painting in a semi-gloss white paint.  Thinking of painting the other furniture to match too.  Here's a before photo of the bed (it will be my first makeover project, very soon!)  Not bad for $169.25 huh?

As for my little guy who is not quite 2 yet....

Well, I've really only got as far as narrowing it down to a few decals for my youngest son.  I'm thinking of one of the following, which can be found at Etsy - Contemporary Dreams:

It will be on a feature wall colour called Reservoir by Bristol and can best be described as a brilliant sky blue colour.

Will also have white furniture but I want to give each room a slightly different 'personality'.  

I'm currently on the hunt for another King Single Bed with trundle (figured the trundles will get a great workout with sleepovers over the years) and when not used for that purpose are a fantastic spot to store train sets etc.  Suitable bedding is also on my list of things to look for.  

So, what do you think so far?

Our final drawings are in!!

10 months, 2 weeks and 6 days after putting down our $750 deposit at Eden Brae we have our final drawings!!! For those just tuning in, it took that long for our land to register and shouldn't be confused with Eden Brae's usual turnaround times!

So exciting to see the final drawings with everything exactly as we have been planning. And without further ado, here they are....

Just casting your memory back, we have converted the original Parent's Retreat and Office into self-contained accommodation.  So the self-contained area is labelled "Rumpus" & "Bedroom 5".  The ensuite off the rumpus has provisions for a washing machine & dryer (notice the nib wall next to the toilet?) and the space backing onto the shower is a fridge space.  After handover, a kitchenette will go in the corner near the spot for the fridge.  At the front of the Rumpus are French Doors which will open onto a deck and this will be the main entrance into the unit.

Bedroom 1 will be the new Master Bedroom and we have converted the media room from the middle of the house into our ensuite, walk in robe and a study nook that faces the living area.  The funny little alcove next to the study nook is for a built in wine rack feature.

Other main changes made to our plans is the kitchen where we've made it an island bench so as to maximise the back of kitchen space and have put pot drawers in there.  We also have some nifty storage cupboards in the island that open into the Family Room.

We also added on Bedroom 4 which will be a playroom / guest room and has french doors that will open onto a small deck.

Loads of other little changes have been made here and there and below is a standard Saville 27 floor plan, so you can really see the changes made.  In short, the only 2 areas not changed is the Linen Cupboard and Alfresco!

We are so thrilled with how it's all come together and feel that we'll be utilising every spare inch of space available.

Decorating ideas and accent colours

I've been putting a lot of thought into decorating our yet to be built house recently!  I think it ties me over when sometimes nothing else seems to be happening with the build.

Aaaaages ago I mentioned to B that I was thinking of Duck Egg Blue as an accent colour in our living / family rooms (one big open plan area).  We have chocolate brown lounges, dining table, dining chairs and basically a bit too much chocolate brown.  Lovely but kinda over did it a few years back.

Here's an example of Duck Egg Blue:

As lovely as our furniture is, if I had my time again or a lovely big budget to work with I'd get at least one of the lounge suites in a creamy / off white colour and have 2 single arm chairs in a complimentary fabric.  I also would have gotten a cream suede covered dining room chair to compliment the dark brown dining table.  Anyhoo, no such luck to the fabbo budget....boo!  So my thoughts are now to balance out the darker furnishings with some lighter colours - namely whites and duck egg blues.


Then I threw a spanner in the works and bought a gorgeous new empire red kitchenaid recently!!!  This made me think that I *should* do my accent colours in red however as much as I love the colour red, it just wasn't the direction I wanted to go in. 

Isn't she lovely?

While perusing one of my absolutely favourite blogs Young House Love recently, I stumbled across exactly the colour scheme I've been looking for on one of their mood boards!!  They've tied in perfectly the chocolate brown, whites, glass, duck egg blue and thrown in a tan kind of colour to tie it all in and add 'layers' and 'depth' (these are my new decorating words ha ha) to the room.  Best part is, B loves it too!  Phew!

I already have some of those gorgeous apothecary jars, bought from Sharnel Dollar Designs about a month ago!

As for my lovely little Kitchenaid, she'll just be a nice pop of colour in the kitchen.  After all, I want everything to compliment each other but not be overly matchy.

So here I am, now trying to find some gorgeous duck egg blue rugs.  They're virtually non-existant here in Australia from my searches so far!  I have however found some gorgeous ones online in the US!  They're quite reasonably priced too so it may actually work out ok to have one shipped here.

Here are some of my favourites so far....

 Apparently this one is classed as grey but certainly looks similar to the colours I'm after...

It's all about pools today

Because we've not bitten off more than we can chew or anything we thought we'd look at some pools today that we'd like to eventually put in.  Will probably be a year or 2 off but doesn't hurt to dream, right?

Due to land size, we're restricted to a pool about 5m x 3m and think the Harmony pool from Leisure Pools fits the bill nicely.  Here's a pic:

And here it shows what it looks like without water. I like the safety step along the side (great for the kids and short people like me ;))

That nifty little water feature actually stores the pump and everything inside it.  Not compulsory to have but adds quite a nice touch I think.

These are fibreglass inground pools and the best bit is they offer a DIY service as well, complete with a template to dig the hole, engineering plans to submit to council, detailed instructions, telephone assistance and the same warrantee the pool would have if installed by pool company!  Pretty good I reckon.

Also plan on having one of these glass style pool fences:

The price tag surrounding pools is quite frightening and I've heard the $50,000 figure used more than once from friends!!!!  That is so not in our price range so B reckons if we DIY we'll save a bucket load.

Just waiting on quotes now.  Eyeing off their finance offer too!!

ETA: Had a chat with the consultant and if they do the entire lot i.e. dig hole, lodge plans, install pool etc it will cost around $25,000.  To do it all ourselves, it will cost around $12,000!  Certainly do-able.  Not right now but in the foreseeable future!

So. close. I. can. almost. touch. it!

Our friends at the drafting company decided to come back to work recently and we got our final plans on Friday.

After spending 6 hours going over every. single. detail. over the weekend, we're quite happy with the minimal errors we've picked up.  Would have been nicer to have no mistakes but considering the amount of changes that have been made, they've done pretty well.

So, it will go back to Eden Brae today to rectify and I still have my fingers enthusiastically crossed that something will begin to happen on site in February.

Wish us luck!

C'mon already!

We're chomping at the bit waiting for the drafting company to open so we can get our final drawings to sign off on!!!  Still closed and due to open next Monday!  What the?!  How much time do you really need to close for over Christmas?

Once this is done, our block will be pegged out and the site will be ready for some scrapin'!

And the land is ours...

     As of 3pm yesterday, we are the proud owners of a block of land.


And now we're (well "B" is) investigating what's involved with retaining walls!  To look at it our block is relatively flat, or so it seems until you start to work out what's involved in having a nice, flat back yard. 

At the very back, we need to cut into it and have a 1.2m retaining wall and scary figures were being thrown around yesterday anywhere from $30,000 to $5,000 depending on materials and if we do it ourselves or get someone else to do it.

Of course, we don't just happen to have a spare $30,000 lying around so it will be a DIY job but there's a lot involved including applying for a DA with Council due to it's height, speaking to our 1 neighbour we have already met to see if they too plan to excavate their yard (no point in both of us having a retaining wall on shared side if both planning to excavate) and the logisitics and engineering involved to ensure it's a strong and stable wall!!

Poor "B" is quite stressed about it all where as I in my naive state relating to anything structural feel quite laid back about it all and have full faith in "B's" abilities.

Council approval!!

Just checked the council website and our plans have been approved!!!!!  Woo hoo!!!!!!

Things are moving along beautifully!

Our land has registered!!!

Who knew you could get so excited about 'almost' being the proud owner of a bare patch of earth?!  Well I certainly am, after renting for the past 4 years I can't wait to be in our own home again!!!!!!!!

We received notification today that our land has now registered and we are due to settle on 7th December - just in time to watch nothing happen for a couple of months while the builders all go on holidays over Christmas.

Just waiting on Council now.  By all accounts our Council has a pretty speedy turnaround so hopefully we'll know something in the next week.

This is all really going to happen!

Today is another very exciting day!  ANZ have come through with the goods and formally approved our loan!!!  There is always a little thought in the back of your mind wondering what if we don't get finance and we've committed all this money & time etc etc.  But we can relax now and know it's full steam ahead.

So, now on to other pressing matters and deciding on the feature wall colours for our boy's bedrooms.  I have 2 beautiful blues picked out.  'B' thinks we should just do them both the same colour but I don't want their rooms to be identical.  Some nice greens to choose from too....

Oh well, if this is the worst of our problems, it's all good!!

Last minute decisions!!!

Our plans are now with Council and we expect to hear back any time soon and our bank is assessing our loan application.

All decisions made, or so you'd think.... Knowing that this is our last and final chance to make any corrections or changes to our plans has seen us going over our plans & drawings - AGAIN - with a fine tooth comb.  Pleased to say we found 1 or 2 extra little things that needed to be corrected on the drawings.  Main one is that in our open plan living area some windows are 2100mm high and others are 2000mm high!  Ummm, why???  Wouldn't it look so much better having all at the same height.

In addition to all of this, I've had a niggling little thought in the back of my mind about the internal paint colour we chose - Antique Ivory (sounds dreadful doesn't it?! Why couldn't our colour sound cool like Dulux's Self Destruct or along those lines lol)  After much internet searching I just couldn't find any pics from anyone who had used the colour and instead came up with 2 other really nice colours that I could see photos of and had originally considered. 

Went and bought 2 more tins of sample paint yesteryday - one for Moon River and one for Nomadic Ivory.  We both decided we preferred the undertones of Nomadic Ivory and then low & behold realised it was virtually the exact same colour as our chosen Antique Ivory!!!! 

So, it was a good exercise to do as I now feel confident with our choices and thank god it all worked out because our flooring, tiles and all other selections tie in!  It has made us re-think our feature wall colour choices for the boy's rooms though so poor old "B" went back to Bunnings today for a billion more sample cards!

Something's starting to happen!!!

After what feels like forever, things are starting to happen!  It's been a week of high's and I'm hoping there's not a low waiting around the corner to bite us on the bum!

Our highlights

• Land is looking finished, with street signs now up
• Developer confirmed that land should be registered by end of the month and settlement to occur early December
• Eden Brae have been granted access to the land and conducted soil and survey tests yesterday (don't believe anything out of the ordinary was discovered)
• Street name confirmed!!!
• Hubby met our neighbour and said they were really lovely!
• Received official sub-division documents and our land is slightly larger than originally thought!!!
• Developer has gone and put in a concrete drive-way up to the building envelope (we're in a battle-axe) - this was quite unexpected but very much appreciated!
• Discovered my colleagues husband is a brickie with Eden Brae and was given the name of a Site Supervisor that they highly recommended - asked our Customer Service Representative if we could have him as a Site Supervisor and it was confirmed as a-ok!
• In the process of organising our loan, we were told of the few banks that do an upfront valuation.  As I wanted to avoid any nasty surprises where possible, we went down this track and the valuation came in spot on for what we're paying (which is what you'd expect but doesn't always roll that way!).  Turns out the valuer has also built the same house!!  What are the chances?!

So as you can see, it's been a great week!!!

Official surveys etc will go off to council next week and our finance application was submitted yesterday - so fingers crossed things continue to go well.

Have to say - every step of the way (so far) with Eden Brae has just been second to none!

Kitchens!

Our original kitchen colours just haven't been sitting right with me.  It's so hard to choose all your internal and external house colours a year or so before they're even put into the house.  So, lots of research and online kitchen designing has been going on this week and I'm pleased to say we've changed our colours and are now happy with our choices.  Our last kitchen I think would have been on the dark side which really isn't what we are after!

So here is what we've picked!  The mosaic tiles will be our splash back and it's a little hard to tell from the picture but there is brushed silver, white glass and a latte coloured natural stone which ties all the colours of the kitchen in perfectly (polar white cupboards, stainless steel appliances and latte coloured bench top).  Plus we thought it would add a bit of interest in the kitchen over all. 

We've chosen stipple seal laminex for our bench tops, polar white for cupboards / drawers and Alaskan for the back of the Island Bench.  Waiting on some quotes but if they come in ok, we'll go the polyurathane cupboards etc instead of polar white.

ETA: polyurathane ended up about triple the price through this particular company.....ummmm, no thanks.

I know it's a bit hard to see but here's our kitchen design (sorry it's a bit blurry).  

There are 4 rear opening storage cupboards on back of island, 3 pot drawers on either side of oven, 900mm freestanding oven and overhead cupboards with downlights shining down on bench.

In the pantry I have added an extra shelf so in total there will be 5 melamine shelves all the way around (wanted to maximise space) and you might notice at the front of WIP I have asked them to leave a handy space to hang a broom, mop etc for quick clean ups.  We'll also be housing our microwave, kettle & toaster in the WIP, you can see where I've put the arrow, so there is going to be a powerpoint there. 

The following pic is an example of the rear opening 'touch' cupboards we'll be having and the downlights under the overhead cupboards.

And here's what the cupboard looks like closed.  Love!

This is the Dorf Vege Sprayer tap we chose.  As the name suggests the tap extends out to act as a......wait for it.......vege sprayer!  I love the really tall dramatic looking taps but our sink is facing into the family room and I didn't want it to stand out too much.

This is the 900mm freestanding Technika oven we upgraded to.  As far as reviews go, not the best out there but it was only about $700 to upgrade so we were happy with that.  That's a drawer underneath the oven too, handy for baking trays.

And lastly, here's a computerised idea of all the colours together (for the life of me I cannot remember the software we used but google free kitchen design software and something will show up for you.

Very rough but it helps to give an idea... 

Electrical & Flooring Selection

We had our final selections yesterday for electricals and then tiles & flooring with Di Lorenzo.  Ended up being 6.5 hours in total which we weren't banking on!  However apart from some final amendments and of course waiting for a couple of new quotes, we are pretty much done!!  Yay!!  It has been fun choosing everything but I will be happy when there are no more decisions to make.

Electricals

So, starting with our electricals we sat down with Craig at Home Options and he was great.  Nothing was too much trouble and he was really helpful.  I had a rough figure of $2000 in mind for extra electricals however it ended up being just under $5400!!!  Whoa!

However we have pretty much got everything except downlights as one of our Electrician mates will do that work for us after handover.  Not only do EB charge $107 per downlight which is crazy, but we'd rather give our money to a mate!  So, for our money we got:

• Powerpoints in every spot that we want them (13 single, 19 double & 5 quads this includes 1 under the eave for future christmas lights and also 1 on the Island Bench in kitchen)
• Surge protection for the whole house
• 2 way & 3 way switches in places
• Stainless Steel Fan Lights in each of the bedrooms
• Wiring in place for all ceiling lights and future lights set up ready to go
• 2 Foxtel points which include a phone point & provisions for wall mounted TV's, DVD's etc
• An extra provision for another wall mounted TV
• 2 Phone lines
• Exhaust fan in laundry
• 3 x heated lamp / lights / exhaust fans for bathrooms
• Stainless Steel fan to Alfresco
• 3 Smoke Detectors
• Door bell
• Junction Box for future outside lighting
• Provisions for external sensor lights 
• 22 Ceiling lights
• Sensor light to pantry

I think the pricing for most of the above was reasonable except for the door bell.  That cost $257 and you can only choose between about 5 of the daggiest looking doorbells.  Next step up from there are about 3 x the cost (and the rest) for intercoms (we'll do that later with so many other things!) Each light baton cost $58 and each double powerpoint is $63 so it's a little surprising how quickly it all adds up.

Di Lorenzo - Tiles & Flooring

Next we went to Di Lorenzo and felt pretty confident as we'd done a fair bit of homework there before and pretty much knew exactly what flooring we wanted and just needed to make final decisions on bathrooms and splash back for kitchen.  Well 'C' our consultant was crap wasn't overly helpful.  Her favourite phrase of the day was, "yes but it will cost you extra".  Almost wouldn't matter what you asked, that was the answer!

We were told that anything with a yellow sticker is standard for us and even though our tile allowance was $24 psm, if it had a yellow sticker and cost $30 psm, we didn't pay extra however if you choose a tile without a yellow sticker then you pay the difference from $24 upwards. What we didn't know was that if you chose a bathroom floor tile that wasn't exactly 200 x 200 then you pay extra for labour which is an extra $18.50 psm! Wall tiles had to be 300 x 300 but we chose a 400 x 200 with a yellow sticker and that was fine.

Main Bathroom

Bathroom walls will be at 1200mm tile height with a 400 x 200 Gloss White Tile laid horizontally.  Floor tiles will be that tile in middle of the below picture 200 x 200 (this colour is not standard and is already $11 more psm so we couldn't justify going next size up).  The top of the 2 feature tiles shown is natural stone and is going to be on the whole bath wall including on top of bath hub (these will be laid horizontally).  We ummed and ahhhed about these as the feature tile over whole bath is costing around $1700 *cough* however after recovering from our shock we realised that it would be such a beautiful feature and we didn't go overboard with anything else in bathrooms so thought it would be worth it.  Our vanity will be white.

Floor tile DC4133 & Feature tiles VM126

Ensuites
Our ensuites will be reasonably simple, with the same white horizontal 200 x 400 tiles on walls up to 1200mm height and same 200 x 200 floor tiles.  We've decided not to do any feature tiles however we are having the below laminates for our vanities.

Pure Calcite for tops of vanity & Fudge Stream for actual vanity (laid horizontally)

I know the Fudge Stream is a little different however after seeing the following photo's we thought it could be really nice feature if everything else was kept simple.  The one below will be the most similar to ours with different handles and a squareform benchtop.
                       

       

Splashback

For our kitchen splash back we chose a beautiful 600 x 600 gloss porcelain tile with same coloured grout.  It will work out around $400 and look like a glass splashback but will be about 1/4 the price of a glass splashback.  Only grout lines will be between tiles as they're the perfect height.

Time Chocolate Polished 600 x 600

The main problem with Di Lorenzo is that a lot of tiles are fixed on the wall and you can't compare one next to the other so we found ourselves going around in circles a lot of the time which was a bit frustrating but hey, we got there in the end.  Apparently as of Monday though, Di Lorenzo will be in a new show room around the corner and will have a library of tiles which you can pick up and move around the show room to compare against each other which will be so much better.

Main Flooring

Moving onto our flooring, Elisa was great (also at Di Lorenzo but in the carpet section).  We decided that we wanted to go with a timber laminate for our main flooring with carpet in Living Room and all Bedrooms (except playroom).  We did have a moment of dread when Elisa mentioned that we'd have to check with EB if we could do this type of flooring as part of the contract but she checked and it was fine.  If money was no object we'd go with beautiful glossy hardwood floors but we just couldn't afford $150 psm so we found a lovely replica which is in actual fact much harder wearing (with kids and pets about) and gives the warmth of a wooden floor.  Our wooden laminate is costing us $55 psm fully laid so works out about $4200 we think - yet to get quote.  We chose a carpet from the standard range which is a 50/50 blend of wool and nylon (I think) and looks nice and will do us till kids are older and we're ready to replace. We did upgrade to the best underlay though which was an extra $7 psm.

Carpet is Savino "Forte" & Timber Laminate is UTF Diamond Tuff "Select Teak"