Planning permission

Check it out, don't dare object to the new windows that we are planning in putting in. Just have to wait till next year for the approval to come back from the council, and hope that there are no busy bodies out there trying to screw us over.

Progress

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Thursday night. Home from work early. Girlfriend had gone to spin class. What to do...

Well actually, Judy a little but of diy in the house. Woo hoo! Living the dream!

I only wanted to patch up the Hooke in the rear bedroom today, hopefully then in the weekend I can finish off the final wall then Sarah cab get in and paint.

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Fire Work

Or should it be work then fire? a day of hard yaka at the house today and even though we dida lit it didn't seem that a lot was done.

I borrowed an impact drill from work and got started on chipping up the screed that the previous people had put down. This revealed a few floor tile missing, and also what I think may have been a floor drain in a corner, maybe to drain away water from a laundry room? Who knows. I also set to taking the render of the remaining wall before or guy comes in and makes the walls smooth. A lot of rubble, we once again ran out of bags and also are starting to run out of room to put all the rubbish in the back yard. I think a skip might be on the order soon.

we finished up early before heading back to clean up then head of to Caerphilly for the fireworks. A few pictures, child hands and some really big bangs. They were really great.

Kind of run out of steam in this post , all for now.

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Sunday working!

Working on Sunday we decided to focus on the kitchen room. With the bathroom coming along niceley our main focus is getting the kitchen area finished. Sarah got out and found a fridge with 30% off, so we now have a fridge. Hopefully it will fit into the house, we may have to take the door off to get it in, but we will fit it in somehow. 

With one wall finished, the second we are not touching, it left us with 2 walls remaining. We will have to chip these back to the bricks before out guy comes in and boards the walls and plasters them, making them nice and smooth and straight. For Sarah and I that means chipping away the old plaster and getting everything ready before these guys come in. 

I borrowed a hammer drill from work and used it to  chip off the cement in certain areas, it was pretty easy where the cement/plaster had blown away from the wall, but in other areas it was hard going. The floor screed also proved to be easy in areas but difficult in others. It also gave us an insight into the previous layout of the room. Before getting back into work after lunch our neighbour Jane stopped in to ask us about the hedge in the front of the house. They want to get rid off the privit hedge. Not yet connected to it I have no issues with getting rid of it. It sounds like they take their time, so this may take till next year before they have even chopped it down. It is not exactly on the top of the priority list.

 

Peter stopped by to help out in the morning, so i got him to focus on capping off the taps in the kitchen. He also installed a tap outside, that meant that the kitchen taps could be removed and the sinks and remaining cupboards removed. This left the rear wall exposed to the hammer drill and I got stuck in hacking off the coal ash plaster. It was quick going but progress soon slowed down as I hit large areas of cement that had been rendered on the bricks. A bit more stubborn i think that it may have outlasted me this weekend and I may have to attack it next weekend. 

It took me a decent couple of hours to scrape back the paint layer on the ceiling. I also left a few bits of skin form my knuckles on the plaster afterwards. Hopefully we don't have to take down the ceiling and the builders can just skin over the ceiling that is in place. The picture shows where we have also run the cables for the lights in the room. I think that a few down lights may be appropriate for this. 

The last act of the day was to remove the plaster from around the back door. Taking it apart I counted three different layers of plaster that had been applied to this wall, all with plasterboard and skim coats. I can't believe how shoddy the work was. It is as if they had just decided to cover everything up with a new layer. This would have continued for a few years and if it had continued in the future then we would have only been left with a corridor galley kitchen in this room.

fire work

More like Work then Fireworks... but that was the plan. We spent the day working in the house before heading off to watch the fireworks in Caerphilly.

Today we hacked off parts of the walls, the old render and also ripped up parts of the floor screed that the previous workers had laid in the back room. I borrowed a drill from work and gave it a good go, got most of the floor up but the walls were a bit harder as the concrete on them was really tough.

The fireworks proved to be a real good show. I took my tripod and got a few shots of them. The only downside was the rain that was on again off again for most of the afternoon.

Bathroom pipes

All the pipes running in the floor of the new bathroom.

Kitchen wall

The kitchen wall after hours of pointing. It look quite good and I am really proud of the result.

Kitchen wall pointing

Pointing on the kitchen wall.

Giving it a go!

Sarah was eager to have a go of the hammer drill that I borrowed from work. But after a bit she handed it over to me for the real work to begin... well it was pretty heavy. It was no problem getting the stuff off the wall, it will look much better when all the remaining walls are looking as good as they should. A bit of plasterboard, plaster and paint then the floor and the kitchen should be finished! Fingers crossed that all that goes ahead as planned as there is also the things like wiring, plumbing, gas pipes, power points......

...so not so close to finishing, but one step at a time.