Monday, 19 May 2014

choosing paint colours

I picked up some paint cards last weekend. Anything that in the shop seemed blueish or greyish, or blue-greyish. But not purplish.
Our starting selection. A lot of choices...
Originally I wasn't too fussed on any of them. None seemed quite right, either too blue, or too grey, or with a greenish undertone. And some are definitely purplish at home. 

But, we may have painters in June, which means we are going to have to pick a colour pretty quickly!
This morning I picked a few that were close and blu-taked them to the wall. Straight away took some off the list.

L and I both thought Pre School by Dulux was ok. Our painter will be using Haymes, so we tried to find the closest Haymes paint. But when we put it into the sun it was washed out and too pale.

Pre school in the daylight. A bit too washed out-it's centre top above
We ended up having to go two shades darker to Sorcerer by Haymes to find one that we liked in the sunlight.
This is in shadow. 



Unfortunately our local Haymes stockist doesn't open on Sundays, so we will pick up a test pot through the week and give it a go. Wish us luck!

What do you think? Any tips on choosing paint colours? 

Sunday, 11 May 2014

the wall

* I wrote this AGES ago, to go with The Hole, but my photos were stuck on the computer!

The slab and the retaining wall were a much simpler process. Especially since we ended up getting a bricklayer to do it for us.

Originally we had planned to lay the slab with the help of a friend, and build a pine retaining wall ourselves. But after researching it we realised a pine wall would only last about 10 years and would then probably need replacing, but a brick wall could last forever. So it was more expensive up front, but it was done right, and wouldn't rot away in the future and need redoing. Also, we were so over that area at the time, and had both gone back to work so it would have taken us multiple weekends. It took the bricklayers 2 mornings over about a week.



They came one day, and laid the slab, let it set for a few days and then came back and built the wall.






We did lay the drainage ourselves between the wall and the soil (side note-there was no drainage laid around our house slab, so when it would rain heavily, or the rain would come the right way, it would lie up against the slab and seep through into the garage. All sorted now, but what were they thinking??).

We lay some agi pipe between the soil and the wall. We made sure it had a slight fall so the water would drain away where we wanted it to go, and then covered it with drainage rock.


So now we are researching tanks at the moment. We are tossing up between a few-maybe 1 big tank, maybe 2 smaller ones that hold more than the 1 big one, not sure. We will put it in before next summer, but after we paint. Eventually we will put a new slab under the hot water system, but we will wait until it needs doing.

It already looks so much better, and tidier. As this is at the front of our house (but below street level-check out the first photo) we think we will plant something to hide the tanks. It will probably be in pots so we can cover up the clay and drainage, and finish the area off.


Wednesday, 7 May 2014

i'm back

Hi lovely readers,

Sorry again for the blogging break. BUT, now we have a new computer (I will try to refrain from tipping a drink into the middl eof this one!!), and L and I are back from our honeymoon in Sri Lanka (what an amazing and beautiful country!).

We are currently meeting with a few painters and getting some quotes to paint the exterior of our house. Next stop-choosing a colour! GAH!

I've been reading all of your blogs lately, but haven't been commenting too much. iPhones are great, but some things are tricky! I've been loving seeing all of your updates!

It's so cold here at the moment, winter has definitely hit with a vengeance (cold for SE Qld anyway), so I'll warm you up with a photo of a beach in Mirissa, on the south coast of Sri Lanka. I've been imaging sitting under those palm trees all week!

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