Farewell old Boatshed

With mixed feelings of excitement and sad goodbyes, we watched as the old boatshed started to come down. When the roof tiles started being removed, a strong smell of possum pee filled the air, and a small ring-tail possum had to be relocated out of the big clump of ivy on the front. It seems that some of the larger brush-tails had already sought new living quarters.....much to the horror of our builders who found possum claw marks in the fresh plaster work of the new house. We managed to rescue the two multi-pane windows with some of their poorman's glass still intact. We hope to restore them and use them in the landscape for symbolic reminiscences of our more humble start. With the windows removed we could see the light spilling into what used to be a dark lounge room. Guess we should have put a glass sliding door in years ago (haha) Many of you may not know that this humble little cottage was Mike's first bachelor pad when he moved out of home. After about 8 years batching, Mike married Kate and it became the Love Nest leading to the birth of our Beautiful baby girl Jessica. By the time Jess hit 9 months it was getting a bit crowded with the 3 of us in a single bedroom. We moved out and laughed that Tina, Mike's youngest sister moved straight in. If you look carefully at the front left hand of the Boatshed you will see the original sandstone base which we are keeping and will support the new smaller boatshed roof. Back to the new building; the time had come to complete the soffit over the terrace. Timber blockwork was installed to support a ceiling fan (outdoors - another Qld influence!) And in another great cover-up, the pipework disappeared behind the sheeting ready for the painters...

Another challenge we had was with the rainheads to drain the large box gutter - we were disenchanted with those commercially available, so we surfed the internet for inspiration and had a modern take on the Ned-Kelly style fabricated to suit...

The downpipes are yet to be painted to match

Inside, however, the painters are already getting stuck into it, with the first coats going on downstairs today:

The fireplace alcove has also been finished and painted to blend in as part of the wall.

Looking forward to a big week after the long weekend, the timber floorboards should start going in, the remainder of the scaffolding should come down, and then the pool can start.