Doug and Rodney finished the work on the house on Friday the 16th, but the work is far from being complete. They have kindly done all the structural work, building the walls, laying the slab, jacking the house up to make it level and then making the place water tight.

Now it’s my turn to finish to off and there is plenty for me to keep busy for a while. I need to get the insulation sometime this week so that I can then fix the gyprock, but today I focused on getting the stair treads ready for staining and painting. I have removed years of dirt and several layers of paint taking them back to bare timber. I have left the underside slightly unfinished because I will paint that part black and then use a natural would gloss to cover and protect the timber. I’m hoping to have them ready to be put back on by the end of the week.

I’m looking forward to be able to walk up the front stairs once more after I have entered through my new front door or if I have been driving then I will access the stair via the internal door from the garage. Either way it will be good.

Even before the insulation has been installed the difference in temperature downstairs is very noticeable so I think all the hard work will be well worth it when summer arrives which a vengeance

At the back of the house the water tank has been rotated through 90 degrees and by doing so it has created a sun block and made the underside of the deck cooler. The sliding glass door from the front of the house has been relocated to the rear which just makes such a difference. The pavers outside the door will have to be re-laid and I think I’ll start to tackle that over the weekend because they are predicting rain for the weekend and so I’ll try and finish up the drainage and a seal the window surrounds before then.

I took a day off on Sunday and headed to Brisbane and cycled around the river via St Lucia and New farm stopping for coffee at Southbank on the way through and all in all it was a great way to unwind after a busy week. As a perfect end to the day I ordered a large pizza which was duly scoffed in no time at all, well I did cycle up quite a few hills on this circuit.