skirting boards

skirting the issues...

So we've started on the skirting boards - a stepped profile to tie in with the cornice. Drew's been cutting and sectioning, then me undercoating, then him glueing and nailing them in. Slow and still a bit torturous as the profile meant some detailed fret saw work, but he does a beautiful job.

And the wardrobe guys came in and did a quickie install of simple racking. Another step closer!

ooh... floors!

Garth the Sanding Dude meets me this morning: 

"Do you know what you've got here?" he asks incredulously.

"Um, Crow's Ash?" I respond indifferently.

"Exactly! You can't buy this anymore, except second hand, and here you have it in pristine condition. Beautiful. I'm telling you, when you sell the house, take the floor with you!" he passionately responds.

Apparently it's about $18/lineal metre, so I'm told. It's come up beautifully, a honey-golden colour with a lot of grain and variations. I also got the half hour lecture on the care and feeding of timber floors, which scared me! It's great to see someone passionate about their job. 

Now, onto the next bits - skirting boards, paint touchups, wardrobe innards, wardrobe and bathroom doors, cleaning the bathroom down, mortaring the loo down, and a host of other minor jobs. Whew!

Crow's Ash

Apparently our floors are Crow's Ash, a blonde yellow/brown timber that was grown in northern New South Wales and considered a native teak. It was prized commercially due to its hardwearing, durable nature, and was often used for dance floors.

first layer gone!

After saying they'd start Wednesday and finish Friday, it seems the floor sanding will be Wednesday to well, Tuesday, Wednesday, maybe, whenever... but at least it's started!! yay! 

So they punched the nail holes and have done the first sanding pass, with the edges yet to do. Funny, the boards look really light... not what they originally looked like when we pulled up the carpet (remembering that they've always been covered up from the very beginning). But hopefully they'll darken and redden up with the sealants etc. Interesting.

Some grout guys indeed!

Scott (aka 'Frodo')(front), and Allan (aka 'Muriel') hard at work grouting the bathroom. Fantastic young guys - finally some good tradies!!

but finally...

... Drew had run out of patience and swear words, and having to work on the house next door as well as Chris' place had left him exhausted with just the hob and under the vanity to go. As luck would have it we finally found a young tiler with great ethics, a conscience and a great attitude. So Scott and Allan came in and finished off the tiling. They said Drew did a great job, with only a few minor technical glitches that only the professionals know about. But they said everything was incredibly well done for a non-professional!

and the tiling continues...

So the tiling continued last week - finishing the top row of tiles and most of the pebble frieze... except for when we ran out. The tile place apparently kind of guesses at how many tiles you need... it ended up taking three trips to get the right number of tiles. *sigh* Drew's done a great job getting everything flush and lined up.

STILL going...

We worked out pretty quickly that we were going to run out of pebble frieze up the top, so went back to CTM and of course... Murphy's Law... they had some but not all. How the girl originally calculated it all out and got it quite wrong we'll never know, but anyway, more is ordered, but of course that holds us up for longer, doesn't it?!

We finished two and a half walls at the top, and started filling in the bottom row - which of course had issues as we happened to start on the high wall... which fitted one tile and one frieze... but then on the low wall we have a gap of somewhere around 10mm. So we have a 10mm fall in the floor, and a 20mm wider back wall at the top than the bottom. Oh the swearing! 

Ah well, another day closer!

STILL tiling...

During the week, Drew jumped into some more tiling - by himself, without his young apprentice by his side to anticipate his every tool requirement. But he did very well, getting all walls (except the tricky bit beside the window) up to one tile and one pebble frieze from the top to go (and the tricky bath hob etc).