So we bought a house.....

BigBoy · 10 Dec 2013 at 14:46

Tiles are on and grouted, its been a busy few months and still a few little jobs to do in the kitchen but its finished for this year.

We have also decorated the living room and changed the curtains (the lovely blue velvet ones are in the bin!) its feeling much more like home now its had a coat of paint.

Cavity wall insulation is being installed on friday so have been manically pulling wall plugs from the outside back wall of the house, 45 plugs in all!! And thats not including the cable clips. Just got to fill all the holes now and jobs done.

Poor quality phone pics I will crack out the proper camera soon and get some better shots.

Mark A · 10 Dec 2013 at 16:30

Really nice work so far, kitchen looks great.

Boiler looks a lot better in a cabinet and the pipes boxed in. Is it ok to put a boiler in a cabinet? I thought it might need be be ventilated? Looks so much better though, i'll probably do that myself if I can find a similar looking cabinet to our Focus kitchen.

BigBoy · 11 Dec 2013 at 09:50

The cupboard has no bottom and top, the left side of the cupboard is only hooked on the wall via a small bracket, the right side takes most of the weight through three 4inch screws through the extra side panel and into the wall. the extra side panel (decor end) is screwed to the wall as well. Its a shame the boiler was not on the other wall just to keep it all looking the same way around but 99% of the time you don't even notice the difference.

LeeUK · 11 Dec 2013 at 12:19

Natural Hessian is nice colour I have a room painted all in that. I also had a **** poor plasterer in last year to re-plaster the main bedroom and the work is shoddy DIY attempt. It has put me off having any more plastering done as the old is better condition.

Nice kitchen.

Pabl0 · 11 Dec 2013 at 18:19

Is the gap on either side of the extractor unit the same, as its really bugging me that its not!

BigBoy · 11 Dec 2013 at 19:15

Pabl0 said:
Is the gap on either side of the extractor unit the same, as its really bugging me that its not!

Its most definitely equal at 4inches either side. I spend ages measuring it all out to get it spot on. Its probably just the angle lol.

Participant · 11 Dec 2013 at 19:48

BigBoy said:
just a shame the plasterer did a really shoddy job of a nice straight wall so the joining corner is rather wavy.

Can you elaborate? I hope you got money off if he didn't do an acceptable job!

Mark A · 14 Dec 2013 at 08:57

I notice you said in another thread you were happy with the cavity insulation. Was it the expanding foam type do you know?

Nightglow · 14 Dec 2013 at 10:23

Mark A said:
I notice you said in another thread you were happy with the cavity insulation. Was it the expanding foam type do you
know?

Put in expanded foam in to brick & block house with uniform cavity is easy, but a cavity with walls built from random stone,I still think you going to have some issues.

BigBoy · 14 Dec 2013 at 10:40

Mark A, its carbon coated polystyrene beads that's then sprayed with a glue to make it stick to everything, as Nightglow said it's fine to use expanding foam in uniform cavities but for hard to treat cavities the have to use the poly beads.

You can really notice the difference that's for sure house is loads warmer already. I could not be happier as the master bedroom has 3 external walls and was getting rather cold!

BigBoy · 14 Dec 2013 at 10:43

Participant said:
Can you elaborate? I hope you got money off if he didn't do an acceptable job!

The walls are uneven in a corner that's very visible because of the colours of paint we have used, had it been magnolia all over you would not see the difference. As you go down the line of the corner it kicks out in a big bow then comes back in again. Not much but enough to be noticeable, and the same with the ceiling it's all uneven t the point one corner is 3 inches lower than the others.

LeeUK · 31 Dec 2013 at 13:35

Is the paint in the kitchen Matt emulsion or Silk?

BigBoy · 31 Dec 2013 at 14:50

The cream walls are silk and the Green ones are matt.

BigBoy · 2 Aug 2014 at 23:48

The father in law and I decided it was time for a new fence on the right side of my garden.

It went from this

to this

Started work about 9am had to remove three posts as the old fence was a mish mash of off sized panels. Two more to remove but will do them next week once my shed has arrived and we can take down the old lean too conservatory.

Found a good use of some nasty velvet curtains whilst we were working

My new shed arrived on Wednesday so I decided to give the floor a good coat of old engine oil to stop it soaking up water and rotting double quick!

Here is the rest of it waiting ready to go

Today the Father-in-law and I decided to brave the rain and put the beast together and trim away some of the trees at the back of the garden so as to sink it right back as far as possible.

Shed is a 6x8 shiplap from http://www.TigerSheds.com its hand built and very sturdy, no movement what so ever. Time for some beers now!

DannyW · 3 Aug 2014 at 11:29

Nice work

I'm planning to rip out and replace my old kitchen next year, Is it best to tile the full floor first rather then fit the units then tile? I know when my dad did his he fit everything first then tiled the floor last

Jez · 3 Aug 2014 at 11:35

Ive always tiled the floor last, bit of a waste of tile going right under where the units will go, they use a lot of the space

BigBoy · 3 Aug 2014 at 14:48

It was the same price for us to do the whole floor in vinal as it was to do only part of it. The joys of friends in the trade.

snips86x · 3 Aug 2014 at 14:56

Great project and it looks fantastic. Nice work

BigBoy · 9 Aug 2014 at 17:27

On tuesday my daughter and I decieded enough was enough and removed all the glass and flooring from the rotten old leantoo style conservatory. She is always happy to help!

And now after a hard mornings graft is looks a little better..

Just 14 months ago the garden was tiny and now it feels huge!
Before

After

BigBoy · 20 Sep 2014 at 20:19

Update!

So today has seen much cutting and use of the new Angle Grinder (9inch none of that girly 4inch ****e!) The Dwarf walls for the new conservatory needed an extra 2-3 inches to sort out all the hights to each block had to be cut to fit. But its all done now and looks rather nice.

The father-in-law and I hard at it.

As far as we could take it today without some ladders!

We also put in some new steps, one at the back door as we had to lift the door when we leveled the kitchen floor.

and added a little step behind the driveway as the wife keeps falling down the single width step that was there before.

Well thats all for this week, hoping to get the roof up on Friday afternoon as I have a half day (need to clean the window and guttering on the room above first its filthy!).