And we finally have a start date for our building work - Hooray!
Work is due to start on the 12th August, just under a month from now.
So - the here's the plan, in a nutshell:
We will be knocking down the existing mish mash of small rooms that sticks out of the back of our house into the garden. We'll then build a new extension right across the back of the house. This will actually come out a little less far than the current rooms, but will fill the space horizontally.
We'll essentially create a new kitchen across the back of the house - about 8m x 6 m in size, with french doors onto the garden, and a big roof lantern to let light in (the garden faces North East, so light is going to be really important).
We're going to continue the extension across the back of the house, to create a new room outside the existing dining room. This will also have a roof lantern and french doors. Then we'll knock this and the dining room into one large family room/snug, which will have double folding doors into the new kitchen
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We're also incorporating a good sized laundry room, with side access (my dream is a bank of locker-style cupboards for everyone's coats, shoes, gym kits and school books).
Then we will build a single room one storey up into the first floor. This will be a new master bedroom with ensuite and dressing room. We'll then take one of the existing first floor bedrooms as a family bathroom.
On the top floor, all the rooms are going to be stripped back to bare brick and properly insulated (at the moment it's freezing up there in the winter, and boiling in summer, poor kids!) We'll add two new velux windows, put in new heating and electrics and a small bathroom.
Our builder, Dave, has said that we will can live in the house for the first couple of months. We will need to move out in around the last week of September - not least because we won't have any heating, and I am not sure I can cope with another cold season huddled around electric heaters! Then we will have a six-month lease within which to finish the work.
I really hope we can be back in the house and finished by the end of March next year. I want to raise a glass of champagne to Dougie's 40th in our 'New' home on the 29th of March 2014. Now that's something to aim for!
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| Wensley - House plans as they currently stand |
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| .. and the new plans |
