First-time house renovation

aliasojo

Sounds like you're all coming along.

My headache for now is where to store all the materials like lengths of oak skirting, bags of joint filler and half sheets of plasterboard etc etc, until Xmas is past. Joiner wont be back before Xmas with the way the weather is going. It's hard enough to get him here on a good day! Wonder if anyone would notice a huge stockpile in the hall if I covered it in festive tablecloths etc, lol.

latecomer

@aliasojo - thats the main reason we wanted to get the dining room done, so we can move the 4.8m lengths of skirting boards back in. Preferably get time to fit them but I guess thats reasonably unlikely given how close Christmas is now. Ideally we'd like to have it available as a bedroom if we need it.......

ukmaggie45

aliasojo wrote: »

My headache for now is where to store all the materials like lengths of oak skirting, bags of joint filler and half sheets of plasterboard etc etc, until Xmas is past. Joiner wont be back before Xmas with the way the weather is going. It's hard enough to get him here on a good day! Wonder if anyone would notice a huge stockpile in the hall if I covered it in festive tablecloths etc, lol.

That seems a reasonable way to go about it. We have a load of pictures that came from my parents, they are all blanket wrapped and sitting in the hallway and landing. Not very pretty looking, but the glass is hopefully safe (glass side pointing to wall so if gets knocked shouldn't matter) and you don't see it all when in living room or kitchen.

Weather sounds like it's going to be pants, so prob a good idea to think about materials storage.

Best wishes and Good Luck!

Hugs from Liverpool

latecomer

@aliasojo - actually thinking about it you should have an alternative Christmas and invite everyone round and get them to do loads of DIY in return for their Christmas dinner

ukmaggie45

OH went and took more pics this evening, I particularly wanted to see the shower room. Tiles been changed, and to my mind look much better.


shower retiled by ukmaggie45, on Flickr

Can't get right into the room as there's new screed on the floor, which is why photo taken from a bit of an angle.

kmmr

UKMaggie, thought you were being a bit fussy there, but now it's done I can see it was worth it. No point having nice big (expensive!) tiles and cutting them up!

I know you will all hate to hear this, but I am so pleased to have my house finally ready, and we had our Christmas party a few weeks ago. It really was the deadline we were aiming for! There are still packets of flooring against the wall of the extension, and a hidden cupboard full of stuff outside, but I think we are really done. Just need a Part P certifcation for final building regs signoff now.

Of course 'done' doesn't really mean done. I had someone in last week (after a wonderful few builder free weeks) to measure up for fitted wardrobes, and the kitchen guy is contemplating options to deal with a problematic door. Plus I am deciding if I can splash out on a nice extractor hood... maybe wait for a few salaries to go through!
http://clearlybuilt.wordpress.com/

Thinking of this extractor.
GooglePrices
InPlace.

Too decadent?? Possibly... but actually we don't have a lot of choice (she says, convincing herself). We couldn't get it to be properly extracting, so it will just be an in room filtering device basically. Not ideal, but too late to start cutting through the building again. Too late for my sanity anyway.

Good luck to everyone for a tidy Christmas at least!

suisidevw

hi guys, i asked this on a new thread but thought I'd ask you guys as well! Just caught up on the progress from the last few weeks. Started my new job and no time for any surfing online at work anymore! any help on the below appreciated

Hi all, This may seem simple to some!

Briefly, 15mm copper pipes in the ceiling of our single brick utility room burst last Thursday causing a massive leak of both hot and cold water after being frozen for days! Anyway, we isolated and our kind neighbour fixed on Sunday.

Up there at the moment, most of the pipes aren't insulated and some have a bit of fabric insulation wrapped around them. The fibreglass insulation was minimal at best (very old) and now due to the leak I've ripped most of it out as damp.

The plastic membrane covering the rafters now has a lot of moisture built up on it all over and it's obviously running down and then down the walls in the utility room causing pools on the floor. Is this because there's so little insulation up there are present?

Obviously we don't want this happening in the cold weather that's scheduled for the next week or so so tonight have been up foam insulating the pipes. would laying new insulation between the joists then relaying the otherway help eliviate this problem?

Any suggestions/advice would be much appreciated! Oh and the best suppliers of loft insulation if you have any! Wickes are doing buy 1 get 4 free but I need 2 max!

Thanks in advance, Sam

ukmaggie45

kmmr wrote: »

UKMaggie, thought you were being a bit fussy there, but now it's done I can see it was worth it. No point having nice big (expensive!) tiles and cutting them up!

I really felt I couldn't live with it. We put a lot of thought into the tiles since the room is so small (90x270) and I know if we hadn't had them changed it would have really irked me every time I used the loo! :eek:

Bathroom tiles are finished now too (I think), not so struck on the colour now, here's hoping it looks better in daylight! We had an awful job finding tiles we liked, so in the end went with ones we felt we could live with. Some toning towels etc will prob make quite a difference, and maybe a blind for the window.


bathroom tiles by ukmaggie45, on Flickr

@kmmr, your flat is looking really stupendous. :j :j :j Bet it makes all the hassle worthwhile now it's almost done. Thanks for sharing your blog. I love your red glass in the kitchen. Really yummy.

latecomer

@sam - I'm guessing that its due to the lack of insulation coupled with the moisture from the burst pipes. I would have thought lots of insulation (cross layed if you have space) and definitely get some good pipe lagging on too. I've just done the pipes in our garage last night to hopefully prevent the washing machine pipes from freezing again.

@maggie - think the bathroom looks great, by the time you've got the usual stuff like mirror etc up it will look even better


Our plaster is drying nicely although I doubt we will be able to get the skirting boards replaced and decorated for christmas but will see what the weekend brings. Bought a christmas tree yesterday - I was told to get a bushy one and its taken over the front room a bit but I'm sure it will look great when the decorations are up. Job for the weekend me thinks

suisidevw

Thanks LC, That's what I thought, there's still plenty of moisture up in the ceilling, maybe a portable heater blasting the area for a while may help?! any thoughts?!