Brick blending issues

Now that the scaffolding is down we've gotten a clear look at the bricks.  We have a problem unfortunately - the topmost bricks were laid last, and they started from the left hand side and worked around, finishing at the front.  And this has resulted in them using the leftover, darker bricks at the front of the house!  The difference is noticeable around the right hand side of the house too.  Click on the pictures to enlarge them, as the thumbnails are too small.

If the bricks had been blended together so these darker bricks were distributed evenly then it wouldn't be a problem.  Like in the house on the right in the top pic, you can see they have the greyer bricks distributed throughout.  But in our house they put all the dark ones together.

We have reported this to Metricon and they are getting someone from Selkirk to come and take a look, and see what they can do to fix it.  At this stage we're not sure what the resolution will be, but Metricon mentioned they will ask if some sort of bleaching can be done, and we are also considering Nawkaw as an option.

In other news, our next door neighbours (that's their garage in the top pic) are moving in soon, so it looks like we'll have a fence going up on that side.  And we have got skirting, door frames and doors inside the house, as well as paint (which I have yet to see).  Pics coming soon!

Darker bricks up top.



Another view of the dark bricks.  The difference fades toward the back of the side.



Looking from the back.  The garage also has some poorly blended bricks.



Scaffolding down!

The scaffolding has just been taken down, and we now have a much clearer view of the house!  It's looking a bit bare at the moment, but the garage roof will provide some visual relief to all those bricks.

I ran into the site supervisor today, it's the first time I've met him.  When he mentioned he was ordering the caesarstone benchtops I asked him if the benchtops would go in to the reveals and meet the window, and he said he thought they weren't!  So it turned out it was the right decision to have this added explicitly to the contract.  The CSC I spoke to said that they always put the benchtops into the window and there was no need to mention it in the contract, but I asked for it to be added explicitly as a variation.

Once the SS had checked the contract he agreed it was supposed to be that way, and said the kitchen window had been placed too high and said they will lower it so it matches the height of the benchtop.  It only needs to be lowered a few cm but I imagine even that will be difficult, especially now that the bricks and plaster are all done.

House from the front left.  The meter box is for next door.

A bit closer.  The white door is the internal garage door.

The facade close up.  The pier on the right will be rendered, and there will be balcony railings up the top.

The back of the house.  That's a lot of bricks.

Inside we've got the side of the stairs covered now.

In the cold light of day

This feels like the first time I've actually seen the house in the sun.  I don't remember it ever looking quite so bright as this before.

We now have eaves, and the wooden feature on the portico has arrived and been painted.  The shower base and the bath hob have had some work done on them too.  Sinks have arrived to go into the ensuite, but haven't been installed yet.  And Gisele has realized that the second floor is a great place for hide and seek :)

The front of the house in daylight.  The door will be gray-purple, and the brick pier on the right will be a gray-purple render.

This is our wooden feature before painting, taken on the 8th.  In the background, bricks are being delivered next door.  Which is odd as they don't even have a slab yet.

After painting, taken on the 11th.

Our internal doors.  Three plain ones and the rest are Atherton.

Something has been done to the bath in preparation for the tiles.

And we have a shower base.

Gisele in her hippy phase.

My car got into a fight with our garage.  It looks better now but the wrong colour.  Autobarn have got some explaining to do about why the paint "recommended by the manufacturer (of the paint) for my car" doesn't match.

Stairs and Cabinets!

The house has been busy lately!  I stopped by on Wednesday and saw the carpenter building the stairs.  And then when we visited on Saturday, all the cabinets had been installed and the pantry built!  It's good to finally see everything that we've seen only in the plans before.

Stairs under construction

Carpenter at work

Stairs finished!

Stairs from the top

Powder room

Kitchen

Kitchen L shape

Space for a rather large fridge.  Now all we need is the money to buy it!

Laundry.  Water connecters are in the cupboards.

Gisele asked me to take a photo of the drain pipe in the laundry

Bathroom (upstairs)

Ensuite (upstairs)

Garage!

Lesley went past the house today and took some photos of a nearly completed garage!  All that's missing is the bits they can't do because of the scaffolding.  And they can't take down the scaffolding until they complete the eaves and clean the top floor's bricks.

Also included are some random photos that happened to be on the camera

We have a garage!

A garage!

Not related to the house .. my wife made these yoyos

And here is Gisele enjoying some cupcakes

Graham having fun at the play room at the Royal Children's Hospital

Graham's prison

Architraves! And more bricks!

The site supervisor has been busy lately, and our house got plastered last weekend!  The plasterers worked through saturday and sunday.  And when I went there today (wednesday) we had architraves, as well as our brickies back and finishing off the house.  They started on the garage too but the scaffolding prevents them from doing too much there.

Bricks!  SS said the house bricks should be finished today.  But the garage will have to wait

They can start on this garage wall at least.  The big guy on the left is in charge.  Last time he told me off for bringing a child on the site without a leash, saying they would get in trouble if anything happened.

The kitchen getting plastered

The ktichen with architraves!

Gisele's room plastered (yes, she has already assigned rooms)

Gisele's room with architraves

The computer room, which I now realize is quite a bit larger than I had imagined.

And the family room, looking out from the kitchen.

Batts!

Things have been pretty busy lately - our son was in hospital with an infected knee, luckily everything went well and he's now back at home. We have also been sick with bronchitis (me) and laryngitis (my wife). But thanks to the modern wonder of penicillin, things are finally returning to normal! So I went down to the mud house today and took a few photos..

Gisele wasn't sick at all of course - it seems she is immune to everything after spending a few years at childcare in Singapore.

The main events at the mud house lately are the wrap around the second floor, scaffolding going up, the front door has been attached to the frame, and batts have been stuffed into just about every place you could imagine.  The upper floor also has batts in the walls and roof, but I didn't go up there because I was with Gisele.  It looks pretty warm and cosy up there.

Bricks have been moved up to the scaffolding.

Batts!

More batts!  Pink batts!

Yellow batts!  All colours of batts!

Gisele by the back door

Gisele by the front door

Gisele out the front