Waiting, waiting... but our electrics are sorted!

Unfortunately our land title still hasn't been released which is a bit of a pain. We were hoping to have it mid September at the latest, but we are at the mercy of council and so will be as patient as we can.

In the meantime we have had our electrical meeting to sort out extra power points, light fittings etc. This is one area where we have blown the budget a bit, but we figure that most of the work would be harder to do, if not impossible after handover, so we went ahead and locked in the things we feel are important (plus a few toys!)

Clipsal Saturn Switches to add some glam!

In addition to some extra light and power points, we will be getting some surround sound speakers installed in the Living and Family Rooms. They are a bit of a treat, but will help streamline the rooms and add to the feeling of space. Our other speakers might end up on EBay once we're in and connected. Although being able to hook everything up correctly without cursing and swearing might be a challenge. I think it best that we schedule a few days in between this task and the assembly of the Ikea flat pack wardrobe inserts we plan on getting. Doing both in quick succession might just tip us both over the edge!

Last weekend we headed out to source some down lights and pendants for the house. Our first trip was a bit frustrating as we probably looked at too many shops and options. Our heads were spinning. Then on the Sunday we headed to Lighting Illusions in Windsor and received fantastic help from one of the guys there. We worked through our requirements and he helped us with advice and recommendations to suit. 

Similar to this for over the freestanding bath (40cm diameter)

To light the steps on our staircase

We've chosen some great energy efficient down lights plus some bathroom and external lighting. Between this visit and a few other shop and website orders, we have about 80% of what we need all sorted and either hiding in the cupboard or on layby so that it is not taking up too much space at home.

I'll be sure to post some more images when I have them.

We're off to Palm Cove for a friend's wedding in less than a week, so hopefully something has happened with the land by the time we get back. 

More interior colour details

Okay, so you've seen some of the exterior, kitchen and flooring choices, now that I have a few minutes spare, here are the wet area details.

Upstairs
For the main bathroom we have chosen a charcoal tile for the floor and the bath hob, matte white rectangular wall tiles in the shower and a simple but lovely charcoal and white feature tile strip for the shower. I can't find the feature tile on the suppliers website to show you, but here's the bench top and floor tile images. The cupboards will be Laminex White Silk Finish Gloss which has a nice shine to it and complements the wall tiles nicely.

Quantum Quartz Luna White Benchtop

Lifestyle Charcoal 400 x 400 Floor Tiles

For the ensuite we really want to make a feature of our lovely white freestanding bath and the double vanity, so we have gone for the above 400mm x 400mm charcoal tiles on both the floor and all the way up the walls to make the white really stand out. We have once again gone with Luna White for the Vanity Top, but in this case the cupboards will be Polar White Silk Finish Gloss as it is a better match to the bath than the standard white. We will have the following feature mosaic in a strip 30cm wide up through the shower and also in the two tiled niches (one in the shower and one at the head of the bath).  These are the ones that look purple when I try to take a photo of them. They are actually black and silver with a bit of shimmery bling to them! I think they will make the ensuite look moody and really beautiful. We can't wait to see that room come together. 



Downstairs
In the laundry and powder room we will use 450mm x 450mm floor tiles in Belga Grey. They are really lovely and look good up against the timber flooring downstairs. If we weren't having timber flooring downstairs we probably would have picked these for the entire living area floors without hesitation.



Benchtops in these downstairs rooms will be just a small section around the basin and laundry tub, so we have chosen a dark colour, almost black, for something different to the upstairs rooms. The cupboard doors will be in Laminex Zincworks. I'm not including an image of the Laminex because the sample online is not very accurate and doesn't show its lovely silvery sparkle! It will add a bit of glamour to the rooms without being over the top.

There is no news yet on the release of title for our land, but we have an appointment in a few days to sort out the electrical plan for the whole house, so we will be closer to being ready to go when the land is ready. The electrical meeting will include any extra power points, exhaust fans or lights that we would like, plus they can do internet prewires and home theatre prewires. They can organise to install light fittings that we purchase elsewhere, but they won't do pendants or ceiling fans, so we will get them sorted after handover as we would like some pendants in the kitchen and dining area and have found a great ceiling fan for the alfresco area (see below). Apparently airflow from a fan is a mosquito deterrent, so we may end up with 10 of them whizzing away given my track record with bites!
 
Ciao for now!

Our Selections

After our contract appointment on Tuesday we had our Colour Selection appointment to choose everything from the roofing to the cupboard handles. The appointment was booked for three hours but we were done in an hour as we had decided on almost everything before we went in.

External Colours
We have selected roof tiles over Colourbond as we love these ones from the Bristile Classic Range. The colour is "Coal".
 
Our front facade will be in the following tones:
Windows, guttering and garage door - Colourbond Woodland Grey
Bricks - Moondust (they are not quite as pale as they appear in this photo)
Two render colours - Dulux Namadji (lower facade) and Dulux Stony Creek (upper facade).
Stone Cladding - Beaumont Multi Colour to a portion of the fascia around the front door. 

Internal Colours
Main downstairs flooring - spotted gum laminated timber
Carpet for upstairs and living/media room - a medium charcoal with warm tones.
Walls and trims: Dulux White Duck Half
Doors and Ceiling: Dulux Whisper White
Kitchen Benchtop: Quantum Quartz - New Diamond White
Kitchen Cabinetry: Laminex Silk Finish in Parchment
We upgraded the staircase to stained timber rather than carpet.



We will add three black pendants over the kitchen island bench to give it some drama. Once we have moved in we will use accessories and maybe some paint to add other colours.

I will source some photos of the bathroom and ensuite colours and post them soon!

Contracts and decisions

Our first visit in the colour selection process was to our chosen builder Plantation Home's colour selection venue Cosham Studios. It's a fair drive from our place so we researched the location of the brick, roof tile and wet area tile suppliers nearby and made several day trips. We'd leave each shop clear in what we wanted but I would get home and start second guessing our choices. I think it had more to do with the colour that things showed up in the photos that I took than any level of indecision. A mosaic tile with black and silver in it showed up purple on the iPad, and the carpet we liked looked very green. It was quite off-putting. Once we were able to accumulate some samples we quickly worked out what we wanted and then tossed out any unwanted choices to avoid confusion.

Yesterday we attended Plantation Homes in Springwood to go through the costings of all of the things we wanted to include. Neither of us slept very well as we had been up late looking at last minute details on the draft plan we had received. I was nervous, having read all sorts of horror stories online about nasty surprises at this point in the process. 

When the consultant spent more time than I anticipated going through the soil test I was expecting him to turn the page and show us a bill for tens of thousands of dollars for dealing with rock etc. Thankfully that wasn't the case, and we found that the allowances and estimates included in our initial proposal covered pretty much everything. The bill was at least $20,000 less than I expected. I was soooooo relieved. After three hours of signing our lives away, we are the proud owners of even more paperwork, and a big to do list! 

I'm so glad we went through everything with a fine toothed comb beforehand. All the hours of trawling other people's building blogs, reviews etc really paid off. Other blogs helped us to consider upgrades, pitfalls and extras we might not have thought of, and I think we were more prepared as a result of this.

The main things we upgraded were:

• Ducted airconditioning (not standard in the range of house we chose but considered essential since I work from home).
• Nicer carpet
• Roof tile upgrade - we're not so keen on the colourbond. 
• Some really lovely mosaic tiles for around the kitchen splashback and in the ensuite
• A beautiful freestanding bath in the ensuite
• Now that security screens are compulsory on 2nd floor slide-opening windows, we upgraded to the nicer, stronger mesh without the "security door" look to it. Luckily none of the front windows or ground floor need to have it as I'm not a fan at all! 
• We added in a second stacker sliding door so both the dining room and family room will open on to the alfresco.
• We also reconfigured the upper level to give ourselves a bigger ensuite and WIR.
• We have added a beautiful stacker stone feature to the facade. (We love it and may also use some in our landscaping down the track.)
• We have also positioned the house so that we have the option to put a pool in later on if we want to.
  
  Below is the stone we are having on part of the facade
  
  That's enough for one post I think! 

Soil Tests and Colour Selections

Things are moving very quickly at this stage of the process, probably because we are clear on what we want and have been able to make some prompt decisions.

The builders have done a soil test and the results are as they expected, so there are no nasty surprises or extra $$ there thankfully. I'm sure most of the extra costs will come from our choice of fixtures and fittings.

If we are able to come to agreement on price with the builder next week, things can move as quickly as we would like them to and we can submit the plans to council as soon as the land is registered. So our pre-homework on colours, materials etc will come in handy.

The builder has given us a list of all of the aspects of the house we need to make decisions or colour selections for and the list is HUGE, which is a bit overwhelming but also makes me feel quite excited too. 

Obviously we need to be diligent with our budget, but within that, we plan on having lots of fun choosing our kitchen and flooring colours etc.  We have already found lots of things we love. Many are in the builder's standard range thankfully, but we will probably go for some upgrades too if we can justify them. Especially for structural things that we wouldn't be able to change after the build is completed.

We plan on having a window for our kitchen splash-back. Very much like the one in the picture below, minus the view in to the neighbour's house!

The kitchen window will be fairly close to the fence, so we'll be sure to create a nice outlook for that area when we plan the landscaping. Dad, you might be called upon for some inspiration in this regard.
The Brisbane Home Show is on this weekend so we might pop in there if we have time. We'll just need to leave our credit cards at home!

Paperwork, paperwork, paperwork, and plans!

After months of research it's exciting to see things fall in to place, but finding time to read all of the associated paperwork has left us with severe brain drain. The mortgage documents for the land are signed and witnessed and on their way back to the bank (not without a couple of boo boos from the 300+ year old Justice of the Peace who kindly volunteered to help us!). Awkward! 

Andy and I have been fortunate to discover that we have very similar tastes in house layouts, decor and furniture. So the process of working out which house to build has been fairly straightforward. 

We are looking to build something like this plan below, although we would be flipping it so that the garage is on the right and the walls with the least windows are on the Western side to minimise the hot afternoon sun getting in.

We have an appointment with the builder for next Tuesday to fine tune our wish list and work out if it fits our budget. Yikes!

It's great to be able to progress this aspect of our plans whilst the land is waiting to settle. Hopefully by the time the land settles we will be all sorted and ready to submit the plans to council for approval.

I'm being my usual stress-head and worrying about things that may not happen, whilst Andy is online browsing all of the lovely furniture and fittings we would like. I need to take a leaf out of his book and chill a bit!

With that in mind, I got up early this morning and went for an hour long walk. Hopefully that calms my frazzled brain and helps me to sleep a bit better!

Let's start at the very beginning, it's a very good place to start!

After relocating from Melbourne to Brisbane in May to be with my true love Andy, we set about planning where we would like to spend our life together.

After all of the packing, relocating and unpacking was complete, we set about clarifying the options that were most desirable to us. City or Suburbs? North Side or South Side? Buy or Build?
We decided we wanted to stay around the same area on Brisbane's North Side, but existing properties that suited our needs were few and far between.....pretty much non existent actually. 

So we started exploring vacant land and......voila! We found this little piece of paradise with the perfect aspects just one suburb from where we are currently living. It's one of 13 blocks in the subdivision of a large piece of land. 

Having a Northerly aspect for winter sun and summer shade was high on the wish list. And this block fits the bill perfectly! Title is due to be released in September, with settlement due 30 days after that.

We are soooooo excited!