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Comment when you see it!

Want!

Totally, totally in love with the work of Ali McNabney-Stevens.  I would so love these for my dining room, would add a bit of colour.

Am a bit over my DIY canvas art. I loved them at the time, but they don't really suit the style anymore. Which is a shame…it took me ages to make them.

So…back to Ali. Love! Love! Love! Guess I should start saving…

What is this?

Can someone please tell me what this is and what is it doing in my house???

Jansen's Mum has bought a brand-new apartment off the plan so all her old furniture will look out of place in the new space so she's basically gotten rid of everything. He loves this chair and has insisted it sit smack bam in the middle of the lounge room.

Boo.

Actually I'll admit, this is a really comfy chair and amazing quality. It's just…it looks so out of place.

I feel like I'm in a Frasier episode.

The veggie garden

We're finally starting to see the fruits of our labour in the veggie garden (as we should, it's been over a year). These little babies are super hot chillies which I'm really looking forward to eating!  Josh and I have chilli eating competitions - first one to go for the water is the loser.

The mint is going crazy, but I don't have anything really to put it in. I don't use mint that much except for rice paper rolls.

The tomatoes haven't started bearing any fruit yet and are actually looking a little sad. We've had a heap  of rain over the last few days so maybe that will improve things.

The other things we have growing are shallots, more different types of chilli and basil. About half of the veggie garden though is taken up with some gardenias that I previously had in pots. They weren't do very well in the pots so I planted them here temporarily with the intention of putting in the garden beds out the front, but of course that hasn't happened yet. Now that the driveway is in, the gardenias will go in the garden beds next to the driveway and the veggie garden will go back to being a veggie garden.

A driveway….finally!

We FINALLY have a driveway!!!! Not a dodgy ramp or a temporary crusher dust driveway but a proper, ridgy-didge exposed aggregate driveway! Oh..and a path to the front door.

The one thing I love about this (ongoing) house project is how much I learn with every new stage and it was the same with the driveway. I NEVER knew how much work was involved in what's really quite a small driveway.

The framing was done the day before. They had to take out a section of the kerb and because the house will be on a small lot eventually (once we subdivide) then the driveway at the boundary can only be four metres wide.

The garage is six metres wide so we had to taper it in by two metres. Originally I wanted it to taper in to the path side but the contractor said it would look better to be symmetrical so I took his advice and I'm happy with the outcome.

We started the path at the outside of the pillar and I didn't realise how wide it really was. The plan though is to put plants and landscaping on either side so I think it won't be as noticeable when that's done.

They started the pour REALLY early the next morning (sorry neighbours) and they seemed to have a cast of thousands. Of course it hasn't rained in months so the clouds looming as they poured but luckily the rain held off until later in the day.  We were all a bit nervous.

We left the footpath in because it's a main-ish road and we didn't want to block the path for the week it needed to dry.

It took the better part of the morning just the pour the concrete in and then whatever it is they are doing here took a few more hours.

Just after they'd started the pour, the concrete supplier rang to say that they'd forgotten to put the in the accelerator that would help the concrete dry faster, so they were in for an extra four hours waiting.

Watching paint dry and waiting for concrete to dry is as boring as each other.

Fun fact - did you know that to dissolve the top layer to expose the aggregate, they pour sugared water while it's still drying? Weirdness. He literally just had a bag of Coles sugar in a bucket.

Waiting for a week for the driveway to cure before I could drive on it was also painful…

But ta-dah! The day finally came and I could drive STRAIGHT into the driveway. It was awesome! And raining!

The concreter came back about five days after the pour to do an acid wash to fully expose the aggregate and cut the expansion lines into the concrete, that's why it looks so much darker than the earlier photos.

Now…just to recap on how things used to be…

…the original (no) driveway. The original cross over driveway was on the left side block so we would enter through there and just park at the front of the house or on the spare block, but couldn't even park a car in there for the first six months until…

...the temporary crusher dust driveway, which allowed us to get the car in the driveway, but we also seemed to drag half the crusher dust into the house as well.

Yep, this is definitely the best! The fence and landscaping is the next things on the agenda so watch this space. 

The great pantry clean out of 2014

I cleaned out and rearranged the walk in pantry this weekend. It took me 3 hours cause I had to cut up the plastic liner for the shelves, wipe down all the bottle and jars and arrange everything into categories.

My life is very glamorous.

New Lounges!

We have a new lounge set for downstairs because my Mumsy-Poo is awesome! I'm very, very VERY grateful. I'm counting this as my birthday, Christmas, housewarming and a stack of other things all in one. They were actually ordered back in March (yes..March), but it's taken that long to get here.

One is a three seater and the other is a sofa bed which is totally awesome because we've had more than one occasion where we haven't had enough beds. So, when the guest room is occupied we'll convert this downstairs space into a second guest room which is actually better than the upstairs one because it has the downstairs bathroom all to itself.

I also recently bought Josh a new king single mattress because he's now 6' 1" (or 183cm) and simply doesn't fit in his single anymore. (And no I didn't get him a double because his room is too small and I don't want to encourage, entertain or even consider that anyone else will be in that bed!!!). But, we will keep his old single and put it on a trundle underneath his bed so when his mates come around they can sleep there. So all up, we can now comfortably sleep eight people, no dramas :-).

When downstairs is not a second guest room though, woohoo, it's a second lounge room/teenagers retreat/media room. The space is shared by Josh's music equipment, so we had to do a bit of a re-arrange as there's still a TV and entertainment unit to come until it's complete.

Josh has rearranged this in anticipation of the TV and entertainment unit, which will go against this wall. He had to take a few guitars upstairs to make room (seriously…who NEEDS seven guitars), but I'm glad he did it cause these lounges were HEAVY!

So we're nearly there with a big thanks to mah Mum.

#grateful

New Rug!

You know what's awesome?! When you see something that you absolutely love and know would look perfect in your home, but it's full price so you leave it.

Then over a month later you go back and it's on CLEARANCE and less than half price!!

Woohooo! I love my new bargain rug! It's pure new wool, unlike the cotton number I had there before, which did the job, this is just a whole other level of lovely. It's warm and heavy and doesn't slide across the floor when I step on it.

It's fabulous. It's cheap!