24.1.2011 BUILDING NEWS
What a week! At last it stopped raining and everything started to happen at once. We had some very early starts, 5.30am the day that the sheep were shorn and 7am when the plumbers put the under slab plumbing in the work never seemed over until well after dark. Our plan to have Mike digging footings at the same time the plumbing was done actually worked. Mike got all the large back footing dug before the plumbers started and came and did other jobs for me when he had to get out of their way for an hour. The plumbers said it worked well for them and we were lucky that Mike was so obliging.
The footings are now dug out and today Edd is working in them with a crowbar to straighten out the edges and remove debris from the trenches. The rocks made the ground too lumpy to get a clean cut with the machine so it has to be finished by hand. It is now possible to walk into spaces that will one day be rooms and get some idea of what is to come. The view is good, which is a start.
At midnight yesterday Edd picked Al and his family up from the airport when they flew in from the UK so when jetlag is dealt with we now have our architect back in the right hemisphere. The reinforcing iron has not arrived yet and we have a bank holiday on Wednesday which is a problem but we do hope that the concrete crew will start work at least framing up this week. We will all feel a lot better once we have the slab down and we can get clear of the mud.
OTHER NEWS
The sheep are now fleeceless and wormed but the first paddock of hay cut got a bit wet with a morning shower. This is a very difficult year. The plants like the rain and we are now eating zucchinis and lots of lush basil. The runner beans have slowed down production but I managed to get bags of them sliced and blanched in the freezer, which will be nice for winter.
One great thing is that Mike had the time to dig the footings for the new walls I am building for the garden and he moved all the rocks and mess from the old traffic island. I intend to recycle the rocks outside my new house and make a flat area of grass where they were before so that it is easier to maintain. One rock Mike delicately grabbed with his digger and carefully lifted it over the fence into the medical area of the garden. It was the rock Bo sat on when she sang at the finishing up ceremony for my father and it needed to be in a special place.
My next task is to get someone to help me drag all the old veranda iron up from where we stacked it and work out how many posts I need to put in and where. Then I need concrete footings and I can begin building rabbit height walls. There may be concrete left over from the house footings so I need to get the posts in before the big pour starts. I am used to people asking where to put left over concrete so it seems sensible to have a place ready.
No comments:
Post a Comment