Driveway Yay!

From Thursday, Friday and throughout the weekend my concrete guy came to box up my concrete driveway and front paths. There was a fair bit of prepping to be performed. A lot of fill had to be put down in the driveway area, due to the slope and existing soil levels. He also came back Sunday to work on the steps that I love by the way. Not what I had originally intended, but when he showed me some similar ones he had done on a previous job, I said I wanted those. So he agreed to do it for me.

We went for expose aggregate, since we have a sloping driveway, we thought it would give us the best grip. I didn't take any progress photos, I wish I did as it would have been good to refer back to. I really only have AFTER photos. Showing the finished result. In the end we choose a Hansen exposed product, as it was better than the Boral choice I thought. We paid extra for the off-white cement also. Which makes the steps look slightly bad since it has normal grey mortar sticking it together.

View looking back from the french doors. This will be built into a courtyard for me and missus, a little private oasis. We open the doors from the master bedroom for some fresh air.

Here it is from the other view. Behind those french doors is the master bedroom.

Straight on view, including path.

We called flyscreen people that Metricon recommended and asked for security mesh. It is a Crimsafe alternative, and even said Crimsafe is over-rated and too expensive. So for half the cost we had this stainless steel security screen fitted. You can also see the frosted front door which cost a 80% less that if it was properly done with Metricon. It's just a frost film applied to the glass, gives us the privacy we need for a fraction of the cost. If we don't like it, we just remove it.

Here are those steps he put in. It is sandstone finish to besser block and sandstone colout pavers on top. Originally I was going to use the sleeps as the facing for the steps. I think this looks better.

Leftover carpet, so we are using as the door mat. For now, untill we get a proper mat.

Path going around the portico

Steps again going to the entrance

The finished driveway. He will come back in 48hours of the lay to seal and cut the concrete.

Front retaining wall

Later last week we had our retaining wall installed. Which we agree look great with the sandstone effect look. It definitely adds to the look of the house.

The contractor spent 3 days on site a half of that was raining. First day was rough excavation and post drilling, the second day was erecting posts and pouring the concrete footings. The third day was laying the sleepers and backfilling the wall.

After I came home I saw the wall from the front and was pleasantly impressed, then as I walked to the door I looked behind the wall and it looked quite ordinary with the lack of back fill. The contractor left us his number if we chose to have him back for backfilling, as long as we supplied the backfill. I asked the contractor to come back when he had time to finish it off, and I asked him how much back fill he thought I needed. He told me 5cum. So I ordered as much and it arrived the morning he was due back, the amount looked too small so I ended up ordering another load. 10cum in total, and it was lucky I did. The final result ended up being just enough to reach the tope sleeper, but uncompressed. So it will be interesting how much the soil compresses after some rain, and how the level will drop. I am not too worried at the moment as I will be turfing this later and there will be top soil laid before the turf which will add abit bit more to the soil level.

As you can see from the photos our driveway has not been done, but nothing is stopping it now from going in, apart from a job that the concreter has to finish before he attends to mine. So far he's scheduled to start Wednesday but with this Brisbane weather, it's not looking good for a start this week, with the chances of storms and rain. I was really looking forward to driving into our garage for the first time next week, to keep the car out of the sun. We've been parking the vehicles on the driveway provided for us from the developer so it's been ok apart from the gravel and road base we have to trip over when going to the front door.

Move in Progress

A bit over two weeks in the house and alot has changed.

The arrival of all our furniture, even with the added drama.

First came the coffee table and the sofa's for the living room from Nick Scali. The Dining table was also supposed to arrive but was told that the one that arrive had a defect in it, so they would try to get a replacement for next week. So we ended up having the dining chairs with no table.

 Coffee Table (we bought clear vinyl cover to protect it from the kids)

 This is the 3 seater sofa

 Then the 2 seater

 The Dining table and seats which came later, also with a clear cover for protection

On the weekend Plush delivered our lounge suites. The big one is a modular set, can you believe they only delivered the chaise, and the other section was left out. They ended up delivering first thing Monday morning. Which was great.

I got to finish off the vegetable garden and put up the clothesline.

I managed to convert the dead space between the boundary fence and the retaining wall into a vegetable garden. I took some soil from out back, and filled it level and added top soil above the clay fill. Now to plant something.

The glass panels arrived also, now these will be installed this week, thus finishing off the acoustic treatment of the house. I can have this cleared for final certification now.

This week is the beginning of the front landscaping. We will have the front retaining wall up and I was advised a week later for the driveway. This is in order for the concrete to cure enough to develop strength to take mechanical backfilling to build up the sections for the driveway edge. I think I might call the turf mob to come in and do some laying while the extents of the concreting is boxed out.