And we're in

After neither of being able to get the day off work we set mum up at the house to be ready for the installation of the appliances. I took this as an opportunity to have a few more things delivered while she waited. Every time mum called to give me an update somebody else was turning up - from sparkies, plumbers and delivery men the blinds were also installed. Mum, dad and Doug put the bed together before I got home and then Doug and I enjoyed a bottle of wine, pizza straight from the box and Ben and Jerry's straight from the tub. A picnic in our lounge room.
The weekend has been full of drives eternal the Hawkesbury and The Ponds, filling car loads and getting them inside. Mum and Dad have been amazing in their help - seems they are quite eager to get us out!
A sense of accomplishment though as the kitchen, family room and kitchen table are all sorted sans for a few paintings on the wall. But it feels like a home now - so long as you ignore the first few rooms in the house!

Post handover flooring

The week is now upon us where we are arranging our flooring prior to moving in.
I was going to write a post about the lack of organisation and how the perfect preparation to have tiles, carpet and appliances installed within perfect timing of each other was all in vein, it was going to be a very negative post. And then last night I saw the quality of the jobs. Saw how perfectly lined the tiles were, how perfectly square the carpet is. And then I let the few days of arguing to find out why we had tilers but no tiles and the disappointment of when our carpet was somehow not loaded on the truck in Victoria so would not make installation schedule. These moments have been washed away with simply how in love with our flooring I am. And also because now out place finally feels like it is finished. Let me hear a Woop Woop for no longer having any concrete under foot!

Looking at the mammoth cleaning job we have ahead of us of cleaning the fine layer of grout off the tiles I wonder if we should have just done our flooring with Clarendon. It would have been easier. We wouldn't have to go through this process. It would all be lovely at handover. But then I think of the time and money we have saved. We have been able to get tiles and carpet installed in a matter of days of each other. To be honest the big C would have taken a week for each. Plus an extra week to clean. And another to check.
The money savings are massive. The exact same tiles would have been an extra $2000 and comparing the quality of lay in our home compared to the display homes we are by far ahead.
Carpet we booked during an Easter escape to the central coast. We went in for a rug - a big beautiful shag pile rug that some can understand was on sale but too us is luxury - and came out having bought all our carpet. We secured a builders discount as well here. The company that originally quoted us at our colour appointment was unhelpful, giving me three choices (which upon further investigation the highest quality carpet was the lowest quality at larger chains) and expecting confirmation within 7 days or the offer would be revoked. This really just peeved me and convinced me that doing this after handover was the way to go. And we definitely made the right choice! The slight pattern is perfectly straight with the tiles. There are no joins anywhere - or at least we can't feel them. They were finished by 9.30am - who knows what time they started!

Tonight will be our first night in and I can't wait, despite the night being filled with cleaning and building the bed. Between the glasses of champagne of course!