Beautiful rugs

Hello folks- I know it's been a while since I last posted anything. As some of you know I have been traversing the world; currently I am here with hubby in Damascus, taking it all in.

So I honestly have no idea what is happening with the house. I assume, as usual, Plantation Homes is going at it with full steam. So probably by the time we get back most of the external will be done?

While we were in Turkey we indulged and bought some absolutely stunning rugs for our new place. Originally I had wanted modern style rugs for our place, but after seeing all these works of art, I couldn't resist. All handmade with stories of their own, especially the antique one (last one). And all excellent quality. We can't wait to see them in our new house.



This blue rug is going in our family room- a perfect contrast to the red accessories and dark wood (I hope)



This beauty is going in the front lounge room

This one is about 40 years old and going in our library

These photos really don't do the rugs justice. They are breathtakingly stunning pieces of handmade art.

And we've got walls!

Our home is definitely coming on, again with pretty amazing speed. In last night's post, I mention that it would be wonderful if we had walls up....and sure enough ALL walls are up. My little boy and I wandered through the downstairs of the house today and were amazed to see the rooms come to life. It is amazing what plaster can do!

Here are some photos as promised:

The kitchen- the heart of our home! The opening there is the butler's pantry



And here is the butler's pantry all plastered



And the soul of the house- the library!

Not happy about the window here or the one in our main bedroom- I wish we had paid more attention to the plans. I don't like how they open out! It's too late to do anything about them, without incurring more charge, so we are going to have to live with them! If you are thinking of building, pay attention to everything, including windows....Serves us right for being such busy people and overlooking important things like that!

Now the front of the house is looking like this at the moment:

The front cladding still needs to be done (perhaps by the end of this week) and of course the render facade needs to be painted! A few more things on the outside and then the chippy arrives to build the kitchen, bathrooms and laundry! Oh did I mention that the brick is growing on me....





A long overdue catch-up

Hello folks!

Many apologies for not keeping you all updated on the build. I was away for two weeks (you can check out that travel blog at http://www.noratraverse.blogspot.com/), and hubby didn't have the energy or time to keep it going. And when I did get back, it was full on with other things.

We did meet with the SS the second day I got back and if I liked him on the phone, I liked him even better when we met. He walked us through the house, explained everything and answered all our questions. I can't wait until we meet up with him again when we have walls up.

In terms of the buiding since I last blogged a lot has happened. The roof and guttering are on and I really like the colour combination (evening haze for roof and monument for guttering). If you remember I was a bit anxious about the whole colour thing, but now that I see it all up and together, it looks good! Yay!!

The bricking is also now complete, the render is on and most of the cladding for upstairs is on. We are only rendering the front part of the house and I am not sure I really like the brick..it's too creamy and yellow for my liking. Perhaps the bricks will grow on me...or then again, we may end up rendering it completely later on.

But the rain has slowed things down a bit, and it is supposed to rain again on and off this week.

Unfortunately I don't have photos to showcase...tomorrow I shall showcase I promise. As I haven't been inside in the last few days I am not sure what is going on..wouldn't it be great if the plasterboards were up?

In the meantime, hubby and I need to start thinking about the pool. Hopefully when we get back from our overseas trip (yes I am off again!!!) in May, we will start chatting to pool companies to discuss our options. Personally I am happy not to have the pool (a savings of $30K), but the kids would be very unhappy. We have a pool now in our present house and it is very loved and used in the hot months. Here are some inspirations:

As you can see we love more the free form, informal pools or lagoon styles (like our present pool). We love tropical plants so I guess it is natural we want a "tropical" style pool with a waterfall, of course. But as we have a pretty small space to work with, we may only end up with a lap pool..boring...fingers cross we end up with something like the pool in the last photo.

What do you guys think? Have you built a pool in a small space?