Monday 5 April 2010

One More Sleep.......

until we are thrown into chaos.  The builders start in the morning.  Right at this moment the scaffolders are doing their job (yes on a bank holiday in the rain) so the builders can start tomorrow on our loft conversion.

I went around the house yesterday taking the before shots so here is a little tour. You'll have to excuse the furniture and decor. We have been waiting for so long for this conversion that it has seemed pointless decorating/plastering etc.

This is the reason we need a conversion in the first place.  3 not so little boys in one small bedroom.


as you can see my youngest has a small bed.  Infact it is a cotbed and he is a very long 6 year old so things could not continue as they were.  The door doesn't even shut.



This corner of their room is going to be the turn of the staircase so will take a chunk out of the ceiling.  Thankfully the floor space will stay the same so should accommodate some drawers.




This is my bedroom and this space is where the stairs are going to start.  It was our daughter's room many moons ago and where that bit of wallpaper is showing there used to be a shelf.  The wallpaper was Lion King.  It certainly brought back a few memories when we moved the wardrobes out of the way to make the space for the stairs.


Speaking of wardrobes.  They really are a relic from the 80's ark as you can see from this piccie.  I want to get a hammer and smash them up and replace them with something nice and modern.

This kind of gives you an idea of how big the room will be once the stairs and a partition wall are put in place.  Not massive but it will still be around 12feet long and 10feet wide which isn't much different to the size of the largest bedroom in a new build house.  Thank heaven for older houses and their big room sizes.  Not to mention very high ceilings.



Now then this one is my most embarrassing photo of the end of my kitchen.  See the white door that is what leads to my downstairs bathroom and back door.  The holes in it are solely as a result of the door banging onto the worktop by a certain son who will remain nameless but he isn't Jack.  The handle is taped up due to being pulled so angrily by same son. 

The brown door (yes another 80's throwback) leads upstairs.

Both these doors are coming off because due to building regulations in the last oooh... 100 years since it was built it is no longer allowed for your kitchen to lead straight upstairs when you have 3 stories.  They have to build a cube shaped stud wall around this bit.  I'm not sure how this is going to work yet or where any doors are going to go.  I like having a door at the bottom of the stairs because it keeps the draughts out but like I say I don't know yet how it will work.



This is the back of the house where the scaffolding will go.



and the roof on the back.  Ours is the slate one in the middle.  Everybody else got a nice new roof as part of a renewal scheme in our local area just after we moved in (18 years ago yikes!!).  The lady who lived here before us signed some papers saying no she didn't want the work doing as she was moving and we weren't allowed to over ride that.  They all got new discounted windows and doors too but to be honest I'm glad we didn't as they all look the same and I have heard it be said that this is a council street and it isn't. 





That is a quick tour of the areas that will be affected.  I will update on the progress as things happen.  I am told by the builders that there won't be much to see for the first couple of weeks apart from a hole in the roof where they will be working out of.

2 comments:

Lizzie said...

Ahh.. memories flood back... This time last year, our scaffolding was also going up. Then off came the kitchen roof, up went the walls... by end of June we had a new bedroom over the kitchen. It was a noisy, chilly, messy time; sometimes it was amazingly stressful, sometimes very noisy, but mostly it was okay. The builders were friendly and polite and the boss was a good man. I got a bit fed up with the dark kitchen (scaffolding) and the constant pop music from the radio when I wanted to work.. also people traipsing in and out when I was trying to have a lunch break etc. You just have to take it on the chin - they are doing their job and you have to do yours (be a good, well-behaved client and let them work!).
The end result is worth the hassle - remember that when you're having a bad day! Oh and don't put your sweaters away, in case you need them while there's a hole in the roof!!
Good luck!

Liz @ Sweetwatersavings said...

The before picture of the room your boys share brought back memories! We used to live in a tiny upstairs apartment where our three kids shared a very small room as well.
Good luck with your renovations!
Liz