Oh, hello!

Sorry, I've been a wee bit busy this week and by the end of each day I could hardly move enough to deal with dinner, baths and bed never mind about such things as blogging. What have I been doing? Well, I think I'll make this one a bit of a photo essay.

Remember the turf we laid last weekend? We ended up liking it so much we thought we'd do some more. So we had another big pile of dirt delivered...

Then I ordered the turf and arranged for Hubby to collect it after work on Friday. Which was kinda dumb because it meant I had to get the dirt spread during the week. So I hopped to it and got to work...

The turf was duly collected and we had to do a few last minute bits of preparation, including compacting the soil so that the turf could be laid upon it. As with any job, safety equipment is vitally important...

As is shadowing the person whose jobs you would like to take over...

And by mid-afternoon on Saturday we had us some new lawn. And some aching bodies.

Tales from Reno-land

We spent the weekend shovelling dirt and laying turf. And this time, for a very rare change, when I say WE, I really do mean WE. Generally the 'we' really means hubby. Fabulous, wonderful, very clever and very capable hubby. But this time we were on a deadline - the turf has to be laid within 24 hours and the soil was delivered only an hour or two before the turf arrived so we had to move. Fast.

So I was handed a shovel and told to get to work. Three hours later, the soil was spread and I had some seriously aching arms and shoulders. Then hubby laid down his shovel and got busy laying the turf while I fed and watered the troops.

And when we woke up the next morning...

Shame we've got this much more to do. Ummm.... yeah, that's this weekend's job.

And the front wall is progressing nicely. Here's the tiered section on one side that is just about done.

And now we are (okay, he is) heading down the side and towards the back. This is what it looks like right at the moment.

Again, yeah that's this weekend's job. I think the shovel and I are going to become very close. Maybe I need to give it a name so I feel a little more friendly towards it?

Around The Corner

We ran into a slight problem with the engineering of the retaining wall and its construction ground to a screaming halt. But it's all sorted now and Hubby is back to work, mixing, measuring, building and hooking up string lines all over the place.

Here are the latest pics of his progress so far. He's rounded the front corner and started on the three separate walls that will create tiered garden beds.

I'm so lucky to be married to the kind of bloke who not only knows what he wants to do but also has the know-how and ability to make it happen. I might be whinging about the amount of sand being dragged through my house but I know how good I have it really.

In other news, we'll be away for the next few days so I'll see you sometime over the weekend. Cheers!

Timberrrrrrrr!

We've had the tree-loppers in again. Before you get all tree-huggy on me let me tell you we've got a bunch of trees all over the block so it's not like we can't manage without one or two. Especially one that's right at the corner of the house and leans slightly in its direction.

First off, it's a fire hazard. Common thought is that there should be no foliage within 20metres of the house. We haven't quite managed that but by the end of all this work we will have cleared the trees from the direct circuit of the house.

Second, while it was in no danger of falling over anytime soon... anything that leans towards the house rather than away from it is always worrying.

And third? Well, it's where the new carport is going to go. Yeah baby, I'm getting carport that's attached to the house!

Reno's. Part 1 of About 39,000

The real renovations and extensions won't be happening for some time yet but the preparation work has begun and that in itself is worthy of a celebration! The retaining wall that surrounds the house is mostly made up of timber sleepers and they are crumbling and falling down. Besides being really really ugly as they fall down around the place they're very attractive to white ants (termites) which is not terrific normally but really not great when you're got a cedar house. So the sleeper walls have to go. The question of course is what to replace them with. In our previous house Hubby discovered the joys of limestone blocks. He also discovered that he could make them himself a whole heap cheaper than he could buy them. The back-breaking labour was kind of beside the point - he likes to keep busy - and after some experimenting, a changes or two to the 'recipe', and a few second opinions he decided to go with limestone blocks again.

So, how do you make them? To start, you order the first of many truckloads of crushed limestone. It looks like this...

Then you get your kids shovelling (while the wife stands around taking photos), add some cement powder and water and swish it all around in the cement mixer. While that's happening you dig out the old sleeper wall, clear the trench, measure depths and widths and angles and all sorts of other stuff and finally set up the mould for the first brick.

Then you pour the first brick and make the woman with the camera come take photos of it.

And then you make a block or two each night after work and slowly build yourself a wall.

He's got to go around the entire house, with several tiers at the front of the house. And because of the planned extension he's got to go further out at the other end of the house. And I'll be following along behind him replanting the garden that needs to be ripped out as we go. And taking lots of photos. Lots. Don't worry, you'll get to see a heap more pics as we go along.