All getting a bit much

After the triumphs of earlier in the week its fair to say we've done very little. In fact "bugger all" would be a fair description.

The whole paper stripping thing has lost its appeal big time - I'm ready to write a cheque to any idiot that will do it for us. Work has become very intense in that just-about-to-go-on-holiday way where everything has to be done immediately. We've totally lost the power of cookery, almost given up on washing up and I can't see us ever cleaning anything again.

Still, tomorrow is our last day of work. Oh yes, then we have to drive to Norfolk for the weekend. Dear God.....

Strip boy, strip!

We've started stripping wallpaper now - a foolish commitment which I think was designed to save us a bit of money. Quite pointless really given how much we're spending. After 3 days we've finished the back bedroom, and were surprised to see what good condition the walls are in underneath the paper. It may be we can get away without plastering after all.

Two other triumphs yesterday; Rachel got the mortgage offer through - an amazingly quick and painless turnaround of two weeks since signing the paperwork! Also, she braved the terrors of Under The Sink and emerged relatively unscathed.

We're getting to the point where there's not much left we can pack without impacting on the ability to live in the house. We've pretty much given up on doing cooking (ready meals last night, fish and chips the night before).

Today we need to apply for our travel loans for the train season ticket. While testing out the commute at the weekend we happened to be at Islip station when the "little train" (Rachel's term) turned up. Looks like a great way to travel, and we'll be doing just that in just over a week's time.

Get packing!!

It's hard to believe I only posted the last entry on Wednesday as we seem to have had loads more activity on the house.

We came home from work on Thursday to find a small round bald man skulking outside the house, and we soon realised this was Mr Builder. We invited him in and tried over-hard to be nice in a sort of please-don't-screw-us-over way. He soon found out we have a damp problem in the Burrow that extends all the way along one wall and under the window bay. He also spotted that this had been treated once before, which explained the uneven line of plaster in the living room. Ah well, extra cost assured.

Mr Architect turned up and talked building talk with him for a while before we sat down to discuss business. He opened up with a general question of Mr Builder to see if there was any way of doing the job differently to save money. There wasn't. We then did the line-by-line analysis (again) to see what could be saved. We shaved more money off the contingency sum, allowed for our purchase of the kitchen (cheaper than the sum set aside in the tender) and found a few other areas of savings. The main saving came from realising we'd been quoted for casement windows with weights rather than springs - a good £1,000 off the price.

Once the price was settled we worked out the construction start date (probably week commencing 15 May) and contract duration (20 weeks - it wasn't a rough estimate, darn!) before waving them off. Oh, and Rachel managed to charm her way into getting the front wall rebuilt for nowt.

Today we've cracked on with packing and have cleared the shelves in the living room and back bedroom, and the chest of drawers in the back bedroom. Most of this has gone up to Horton-cum-Cuddle-Me. It feels like we'll have the place cleared before we have our week off.

Confirmation received that the lovely Adam is going to help us move the heavy stuff when we hire the van. Thank God - my back is killing me already

It's all getting very busy

OK, so since the last post on this blog a lot has been happening.

Once we'd made our decision to press ahead with the work Rachel got on to Mr Mortgage, and he came out to see us. At first it felt like we'd be paying him through the nose for something we could do ourselves, but it turns out all the fixed rate mortgage deals are coming off the table but they can get an application in under the wire using their system. Nice one. Hopefully we should be hearing something firm next week.

The biggest area of development is with the kitchen - down to us to specify and order - which we did at the weekend. We took advantage of a Bank Holiday deal at Wickes and ordered a very nice kitchen from their Manhattan range. We've also ordered our appliances through them, which is expensive compared to what you can get them for elsewhere, but some selected discounts and a free dishwasher tipped the balance there! The deal is a killer too - we put 10% down, get 12 months interest free but don't pay anything until delivery, and we can change our mind on part or all of the order. If everything goes belly up we can cancel and get our deposit back. Amazing!

We've also started packing. Well, a bit. We cleared most of the dining room and took the stuff up to Horton-cum-Cuddle-Me. Looks like there will be enough room in the garage for our stuff. I've booked a van for the 5 May, and will see if anyone else is around to help out on the day as I doubt my back will last.

We've got a meeting lined up with Mr Architect and Mr Builder tomorrow where we get to do hard-nosed negotiation and ask for the front wall to be rebuilt in the price too! We'll see...

It's crunch time....

Last Wednesday was the day we'd been waiting for for what seems an eternity - the day the tenders came back from the contractors with prices for the work to our house. We'd been making excited bets between us about how much it would cost. Rachel's were considerably lower than mine.

So when the time came to reveal the prices we'd both underestimated...and then had to add on VAT on top of it. It quite took the wind out of our sails, and for a while it felt like the whole project was sunk without a trace. We took a deep breath, then went through every line of the tender to see how we could bring the price down to something more bearable. An hour later we had something that was about 10% cheaper but still more than we'd hoped. Also, we'd had to ditch some of the nicer touches in the process, like my beloved front garden.

Mr Architect was very patient throughout all of this, and did his best to try and save the situation. He undertook to speak to Mr Builder and see if he could work out anything else. Meanwhile we gave the whole thing some more thought.

So, a few days on and things seem to have become much clearer. Rachel has also talked to her parents and some friends, and the message coming back is "bite the bullet and go for it", which is pretty much the conclusion we'd come to anyway. We're going to get in touch with Mr Architect and sort out a meeting with Mr Builder to talk through things. We've also got Ms Estate Agent coming on Wednesday to give her views on what it might all be worth when finished, but more likely to try and persuade us to sell due to the shortage of Victorian properties in the area. We're pretty sure we're not going to do that.

So it's all starting to move pretty fast. 4 weeks today and we'll have moved into the Outlaws' place at Horton-cum-Cuddle-Me. Yesterday we bought boxes from Big Yellow for packing stuff in, an also some wallpaper stripping tools for doing upstairs. Today we've been looking at kitchens, and have found one we both like. I've also stripped all the ivy off the front wall to see if its worth saving - the jury is still out on that one.