A change of direction

Life is a funny thing - just when things seem certain, it all changes. We've spent the last few months crunching the numbers on the new house, & have concluded it doesn't really add up to a good value project. Too little house for too much money. So after weighing up our options we're now planning to build a tiny house (on a trailer - in the bottom garden), complemented by a "garden studio" on the top terrace. All of which requires no building consent, no engineers, no architect...just us & a very steep learning curve!

So, were underway again - 1st step is the "garden studio" - ie a 10m2 hut - which is an important stepping stone to the tiny house, as we know absolutely nothing about building :-)

Check out the action shots below, & a wee video clip here

Proud as punch after digging 6 holes

15 holes ready for piles

Mr Grey inspecting the building site

Re using your concrete paths

Well we seem to have almost done it - cleared the site of all hard fill that is. The jackhammer was just the bees knees, & actually quite good fun - once you heave the beast into position it's not too strenuous at all. After breaking up all the back area outside our old kitchen & back patio, we decided we should at least have a go at recycling our concrete paths. A quick peruse of the world wide web confirmed our suspicions - there are lots of good ideas out there for up-cycling one's concrete ie it need not be biffed into a skip.

Slabs of concrete ready for re-use, just the small matter of shifting them for us to do... 

A delightfully messy scene at 3 York

Meanwhile out on the street its all action too as they replace all the wastewater pipes in the street

The sting in the tale...

Just when we thought we were about to polish off the demolition, 2 skips booked & bodies prepared for lugging all the remaining hard fill, we discovered...yet more concrete. Turns out that several areas out the back of our old kitchen were not just cute brick spirals on earth - in between lies a sturdy crust of cement. Sigh.

On the upside it looks like we might be able to borrow a jackhammer of some sort for the final cleanup - sounds exciting, if a little j-j-j-judddddddddering :-)

An almost tip-top full skip - plenty more where that came from

Lurking underneath that sandy stuff is yet more concrete

"Wow, it looks like a battlefield"

Yup thats the words from friends in Austria following the house progress online. It is pretty messy, but thats all about to change with the final cleanup planned for this coming weekend when we'll round up all the broken bricks & concrete, & hurl it all into a skip. So, the "battle of the bricks" is almost over.

We had great fun with the sledgehammers again this weekend, with the old back door step & toilet floor slab providing some stubborn resistance. Marty was especially taken with the big ol' sledgie - see this video of him in action.

Here's the battlefield - Monday 25 August

Nessie removing nails from the sarking

Oh the joy of doing anything other than lugging bricks :-)

Time for the sledgehammer

We've had a very fine selection of sledgehammers leaning up against the fence for a number of weeks now. At long last we had something for them to do over the weekend - double brick walls, yumyum!
Having picked the bricks off our walls down to a civilised height, we deemed it safe enough to smack 'em down - kinda satisfying in a very destructive way :-)

Funny enough this turned out to be the long way round in clearing the bricks - so much mess is created in using the sledgehammer, that it actually worked out to be quicker & more efficient to remove them one by one & plop them directly into the wheelbarrow. Perhaps a good example of a seemingly fast & quick-fix solution actually being more time-consuming in the long run...

Some video clip action for fun :-)
Nessi with sledge     Ollie & sledge part 1    Ollie & sledge part 2    Ollie & sledge part 3

Friday 15 August

Ready for sledgie action

A mysterious gift from a neighbour - very yummy!

Tuesday 19 August - all walls down, yippeeee :-)

Archaeologists Patrick & Elsa digging for treasure

A giant brickmonster is nibbling my house

A huge weekend for moving bricks - totally amazing team effort! Massive thanks to all who pitched in with brick shuffling, baking, & shifting bay windows:

Guy, Lilly, Hebe, Fi, Autumn, Theo, Dave, Esther, Al, Becks, Libby, Esme, Marty, Rach, Eva, Bruce, Jo, George, that guy from next door (Snail?) & James.

Looking back up at the house from the campervan each morning, it honesty looks like some kind of giant brickmonster caterpillar creature has been snacking on the house - little by little it's disappearing. Well, being rearranged really - the pile of bricks in the lower garden is getting pretty impressive too.

Biggest challenge of the weekend was the bay windows - the small one came out OK & was movable by 6 blokes. The big daddy bay windows are a different kettle of fish - the first got removed, & was promptly returned to it's perch on the brick wall, before being lowered onto a homemade frame for disassembly. Once the heavy timber was peeled off, & glazing removed, it was way lighter. Huge thanks to Craig at Canterbury Glass for coming round to remove the glass.

Friday 8 Aug - a few little nibbles off the tops of the walls

Guy, Lilly, & Fi on the bricks, Theo driving the truck

Fi & Dave hurling bricks down the custom designed brick shute

Autumn joins the brick action
There's that blue helmet again, matched with blue overalls - fashion genius :-)

Esther charging into it

Lunchtime!

Who would have thought bricks could be this much fun! 

Nessi qigonging it up, Sat night bonfire
Check out those spotty pants...

Sunday 10 August

Small bay window is out

Big daddy bay window - mmm, yet to be moved

Monday 11 August
Brickmonster very hungry

From the sky down

So, after almost a month of preparation we're now into the more visible end of the deconstruction - taking the roof off, removing all the framing, busting out the ceilings, & then removing the ceiling framing. Not much left now but bricks...

Friday 1 August - iron still on

Saturday 2 August - roofing iron removed

Sunday 3 August - about half of the roof framing removed, sarking piled up in the foreground

Monday 4 August - all roof framing goneburger, ceiling still in place

Tuesday 5 August - all iron, roof & ceiling timber removed. Not much but bricks left :-)

cuppa tea with the right honourable Kenneth Palmer

Mr Finn using his "study day" for  marvelous educational outcomes

Inside out

The inside deconstruction is pretty much done now, with much success getting our nice rimu cabinets out with minimal damage. We discovered some wee treasures along the way too...

So as we come to the end of July it's time to go outside for a bit.

check out the wall paper, buried several layers down!

living treasure Ken Palmer joins us for some recovery fun

we now have a party tent too...the ideal companion to life in a campervan

I'm too sexy for my chemical-proof suit

The photos say it all - what would drive a person to wear that white thing? Asbestos. Fortunately not much of it, but enough to be careful about. The kitchen & bathroom was also pretty grotty with all sorts of hitherto unidentified life forms & fungal growths. The big upside of the chemical suit was warmth - wow they roast - we now understand all the excitement over onesie's :-)

front verandah missing

so, why would you use this stuff?

asbestos bagged up & ready to go

darthvader lookalike comp

kitchen & bathroom gone!