I’ve quit my job and I’m now driving our son from Adelaide to Birdwood daily for school. While he’s in school I get about 5.5 hours out on the block to get some work done and then it’s back to school, pick him up and back to town.
We have secured a rental in Birdwood that is available from Feb 9 and we’ll be moving the essentials to this place ASAP so we can avoid putting the boy through the daily 100km round trip. He’s been a trooper with it so far but I know he’d rather be playing than strapped into his car seat for at least an hour a day.
I’ve been able to use the time he’s in school well for the 3 days it was possible to work this week, managing to mix and pour around 3 cubic metres of concrete into the footing pads for the verandah. I’m utilising the trade racks on the ute and taking safe amounts of timber and other materials with us each trip so the entirety of the verandah is just about sitting there ready to be built. By safe I mean we are driving through Chain of Ponds daily and having a raised centre of gravity, even just a hundred kilos or so, is enough to make the trip uncomfortable with the ute pitching and rolling around even at the much slower pace being travelled at keep the boy comfortable.
Before I can start with the verandah I need to finish anchoring the threaded rods into the wall so the verandah wall plate can be bolted to this. That should be finished by next weekend and then I’m thinking a week to cut to size and assemble the verandah. While I’m anchoring the rods I’ve also been levelling the rest of the top plate and only need to cut and fit the lintels before the top plate can be bolted into place.
The roof trusses are on site along with the kilometres of timber used for battens and purlins and it took me 2 full days to move all that from the driveway onto the safety of the slab. We should get them up and the majority of the braced wall framework into place inside another week, at which time I will order the roof cladding and insulation which has a 3 day lead time.
Once we are at lock up I’ll be back to work and plugging away at the build before and after work and on weekends. It’s also time for a couple of tradies to come in and get the electrical and plumbing out of the way for us.
The dream, she is a getting closer.