Panelen på!

The cladding's going up! And it looks pretty damn good! Driving past all the other newly built houses in the area, smirking and thinking 'our house is nicer than yours!' Ha ha, not nice of us, but oh so true haha!

Went out at the weekend to pull up the water pump which had broken last week. Have lost sleep over it, thinking about how to fix it, who should fix it, pay for getting it fixed... We were pulling and pulling and when it finally emerged out of the hole, Matt shouted 'it's not broken, it's just popped out'! Great news! Basically, the hose had popped out of the connection to the actual pump. That was it! Handy-man-Matt fixed it and back in it went! Phew!

And then we went to Hornbach, my new favourite store, to buy more piping to prepare for the upstairs underfloor heating pipes. Tried to have a look at buying oil to prep the cladding (panel), but they only sold it in 2.5 litre tins! I mean, how many would you have to buy then, a hundred... Ridiculous, so the search continues.

This week will see lots and lots of progress! We hope, since we're already running a week behing schedule (actually three from the very first time plan). Cladding will be finished, the rest of the windows will go in. Electricians will start, and think there will be some progress on the inside too! Exciting!

Visible progress!

The tin is being put on the window boxes! It looks G R E A T ! The finish on the tin is more matt than the test version, and it's looks really good! A big tick in that box! The guys are also starting to put up the wooden cladding (panelen), so that will make a huge difference to the appearance!

The aim for this week is to put in at least a couple of the biggest windows, and by the end of next week, all windows should be in.

Roof guys have started too, raining today so not sure what will happen there, but it's all under control anyhow.

And Mr Matto did a bit of work himself, marking out and putting up empty piping (tomrör) to prepare for the underfloor heating pipes. He said he thought some of the builders probably thought he was a worker too, but when the rolled up empty pipe went everywhere and was like an unruly snake, he said they probably thought he was a right novis haha!

Finally we might have a potential problem... The water pump have stopped working. Very annoying! The electricians will have a look on Friday to see if it is an electrical connection gone wrong. Otherwise we'll have to get a plumber in. Fingers crossed we don't have to.

Scaffolding and floor boards

Scaffolding is up around the house, to prepare for the wooden cladding (träpanelen) going up up next week! The black tin (plåt) around the window boxes will also be put up, most windows will go in and roof will be completed! Very exciting!

A big thank you to Daniel at Nordhus who is brilliant! He's calmed my nerves and taken over all the planning to do with the roof (which has been a roller coaster ride for the last few weeks) - all we have to do now is wait for it to be done and pay the bill, which we were to do in the first place anyhow!

And yesterday we went out to carry 64 'floor boards' (spårade spånplattor) for the under floor heating on the top floor, from the bottom of the hill, up to the house... Clever as we are, we loaded the car and drove up and down eight times to save our backs and legs. It was all done in one hour!

Kräftskiva in da house!

According to Swedish tradition, crayfish parties should be held in August time. According to mine and Matt's tradition of hosting parties in pre-ready spaces (Matt's 30th in the flat whilst it was still a dump... The new year's eve party in the record store during renovation...), we had a crayfish party at the house!

It was brilliant! It poured down with rain in the morning, but the sun came out well before it started and it was lovely and warm when everyone arrived! Good friends, good crayfish, a few snaps and some music. Nice!

Carrying rubbish galore!

Went out to the house yesterday with a rented van to remove a load of building rubbish. The builders had collected some under a tree upon request from us, but it seemed as though they have been a lot more tidy in the beginning of the build compared to now... On top was a jumble of rubbish and underneath all of that, there was actually bin bags with rubble in... Much better. Will have a word with the boss I think.

Tessan and Danne plus kids were there to have a gander at the process. Here are some more pics of the current status!

Bathroom styley!

For those of you who don't know myself and Matt - We have big difficulties in agreeing on how to decorate the house... BIG difficulties... It's because we're both really passionate about design, but have different ideas of what's good and bad. The good thing is that when we finally agree on something (which we normally do), we're both really happy about the outcome! So phew!

That is why I'm proud to introduce our bathroom to be! The colour of the floor tiles depend a little on wether or not we can buy them second hand off a café owner, or not.

The rendering is a little dark, but Matt the rendering-king-ding-a-ling has done a fab job I think! So: Floor is patterned tiles, right-hand side wall is black tiles, with black cupboard under the sink. Other walls are white tiles. And then shelves somehow on white wall.

Windows going in...

... well, two at least. And two options of how to finish the facade. We of course want the option without the eye-sore - the added bit of wood going vertical.... We'll see what the outcome will be.