Foundations

Great news this week as the foundations have been approved and we can move on to the next stage. 

Progress all seems quite rapid at the moment but the weeks are flying and it's almost one month since work began. 

Here are some more all-important piccies. 

It has to get worse before it gets better

It's a truth universally acknowledged that in order for a new house to be born the old one must pass away first. It has to get worse before it gets better! As you'll see we are still at the early stages of things getting worse and surprisingly we're either in denial or we are experiencing some remarkable God-given peace about the whole thing! 

So what have we been up to these past couple of weeks? Here's a (not so brief) summary of all that's been going on with the build and behind the scenes.

Work has been continuing on site:

The archway to the right hand side of the house (as you face it) has been demolished and the garden area is being prepared for foundations to be dug this week. 

There are supports in place in the old lounge ready for windows and walls to be knocked out and the floor is being ripped up ready for the retrofitting of underfloor heating and the new flooring. 

The driveway is now almost all dug out and there only remains the completion of a hard-standing ready for big trucks and delivery lorries to use. 

Next week will see our building inspector come out to check the soil conditions to establish the depth of foundations required and foundations get dug out. 

For those of you who are more interested in the finer details; we've had to knock out one window and rip up the flooring in order to establish that we are no longer resident at the property for the purposes of council tax. Otherwise we'll end up paying council tax twice - on the rental as well as the house undergoing renovations. It's the overly thorough and beaureaucratic nature of the council tax system (that's the polite way of saying it) that means in order to be uninhabitable a property must not be water tight or have other major issues like no flooring! Still we hopefully will persuade the council that we are definitely unable to live there! 

Finally and perhaps most excitingly we have agreed and paid the deposit on our new kitchen!! Scary because it's a big feature in the open plan living/kitchen area and important to get right, but great as we love the design and can't wait to see the kitchen on display at the home building and renovating show at Sandown Park in Esher this summer! 

http://www.homebuildingshow.co.uk/show-info/venues

I think that's all we've been up to - here are a few more piccies!