Cheery's country living adventure
Comments
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Cheery, I love your MSE diary. Can you give me some clues on what to google to find your blog?
Thank you6 -
Hi Cheery
I do hope you finally manage to get the granite pricing sorted out, what a palaver you have had. I'm another fan of granite and we have it here ourselves. Wear and tear wise granite is fantastic in my opinion because it doesn't age, it is so easy to keep clean and you can place hot pans, etc. on it straight from the stovetop or oven. We have had ours for over 10 years now and it still looks as good as the day it was fitted. We just wipe it over as and when we have been cooking and once every 6 months or so we use Method Granite spray cleaner to give it a nice shine. This cleaner is around £4 for a 354ml bottle and lasts us absolutely ages, I think we have only bought maybe 2 or 3 bottles in the whole time we have had granite and our kitchen is very large. We added an island to our kitchen last year and had matching granite put on that too and looking at our 10 year old install of it you wouldn't know they were installed just over 10 years apart.
Although you are having constant problems finding granite I am sure it will be worth it in the long run. If you are like us you will probably only refit your kitchen once and as granite worktops will go on forever you will never need to replace them. So for us here it was definitely money well spent.
Hope that info is some help to you.
Edwink x**3.36 kWp solar panel system, 10 x Ultima & 4 x Panasonic solar panels, Solaredge Inverter **Biomass boiler stove for cooking, hot water & heating **2000ltr Rainwater harvesting system for loo flushing - **Hybrid Toyota Auris car **1 ex-battery hen - RIP Pingu, Hoppy & Ginger ****Hens & Ducks**** chat thread. http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=528220910 -
Thanks edwink! Yes, this is definitely a one off - I'm hoping the kitchen will outlast me (or at least outlast my time in this house!)
Penny, I'll drop you a PM 😊 Don't mind people knowing, but I'd rather not have the two publicly linked 😊
Gosh, today has gotten away with me. So much rain this afternoon, did a lot of sorting out of photos and did do a blog post, then we popped out to collect a parcel (first time we've used the lockers at the supermarket - we could get an earlier delivery to them - it was good actually!)
Did a bit of a stock up on cereal, coffee, loo roll and biscuits for the builders while we were there.
Still not done any financial stuff...7 -
Cheery_Daff said:
Penny, I'll drop you a PM 😊 Don't mind people knowing, but I'd rather not have the two publicly linked 😊5 -
Good grief, it's been horrendous for you! I'm glad you've got a break tomorrow with friends. About granite, by the way - while I was on holibob, we went to see a Tide Mill, and I asked about granite for the quern stones - it's hard enough, but too granular (ie people ate a *lot* of granite if they used it for their querns ).2023: the year I get to buy a car6
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You do so well with the premium bonds Cheery! We have never won anything…..maybe we are saving up all the luck for the million!!5
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Ha, fingers crossed about saving all our luck for the million! 😂😂 Hope I'm not wasting mine winning a little bit each month 😮 I strongly suspect I will get less lucky the more money I take out to pay for the kitchen...
KC, that's interesting about the granite! I hadn't really thought about it being granular in that way.
Struggling to get going today. Lazed around this morning, then met friends at a little event, had tea and cake, then went back to theirs for a bit. Got back at half 1, and since then mostly been dozing, thinking about hanging the washing up (but not actually doing it) and getting lost down internet rabbit holes 🙄
Washing is going to have to go inside now - it's been raining on and off all afternoon anyway.
So let's have a plan.
4.45 - 5.30 RECOMBOBULATING
* cup of tea
* update kitchen spreadsheets
* eat leftover risotto
5.30-7 RESTORING ORDER
* shut chickens in
* clean out chicken house
* put old washing away
* hang washing up
* wash dishes
* clean kitchen
* put food shopping away
7.30-8 PREPARING FOR TOMORROW
* make lunch
* pack bag
* lay out clothes
* make sure plasterers have tea and biscuits
8-8.45 EMAILS
* email hairdresser
* email kitchen geezers re granite
* email builder
8.45 Relax towards bedtime with a nice drink
Just transferred September's Happy Wheel dosh to the kitchen fund, which now stands at £4414.25, which is 63% of what we're aiming for. Hooray!8 -
OK, kitchen spreadsheets updated.
Spending so far
= £11,153 😮
Actual costs we know about so far = £26,001
Then, I've got extra things that will likely cost more, but I don't know how much.
Already had roughly £4000 on this list for extra plumbing, replacing a lintel, insulating a stud wall, and installing far more lights and plug sockets than they'd planned.
Now I've added an extra few things, but am really just guessing at how long they took.
* builders re-doing cellar wall cos we didn't like it 🙄 = 2 hrs ×£75 = £150
* plasterers re-doing light fitting holes in plasterboard cos builder had done them too high = 2 hrs x £55 = £110
* builders taking render off (rather than building new stud walls) = 4 days x 8 hours x £75 = £2400 (surely this is a wild overestimating- it would have taken them ages to build a stud wall anyway??)
* plasterer doing a couple of sections of bonding plaster rather than boarding = 8hrs x 4 days x £75 = £1760
Hmm, we're coming to an extra nearly £4000, which is nearly an extra £8000 in total, on top of the £26,000 we know about, taking us up to £34,000 😮
Hoping some of those builder costs are wild overestimating- yes, taking render off will take longer than building stud walls, but I don't think it took 4 days longer. And a bit of extra bonding plaster will take longer than boarding, but again not 4 days for 2 plasterers...
Hmm. Not sure I'm helping myself doing this, but it's certainly putting a bit of a brake on us spending anything else 🙄😂
Definitely having Uber Frugal November in this house...7 -
Re: granite and wearing down.... Pic showing 2 granite rolling pins bought at the same time - 1 hardly ever used and 1 frequently used - they used to be the same size
I am the master of my fate; I am the captain of my soulRepaid mtge early (orig 11/25) 01/09 £124616 01/11 £89873 01/13 £52546 01/15 £12133 07/15 £NILNet sales 2024: £209 -
Ooh, how interesting greent! Did you keep one as a control??
I'm progressing with the list - chickens in and cleaned out, food and treats topped up, and I'm half way through the washing up (just waiting for the kettle to boil again 🙄)10
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