Nimmitabel: A Work in Progress: November 2020

Well, it was over four months since my 2nd last visit, and less than a week from my previous one (making up for lost time)

I came back to do more in the garden, and also to strip the wallpaper in the dining room in preparation for hard plastering inside - however Restoration Australia prefered me to wait on the wallpaper stripping front so that they could capture it on film in all its messy glory

But first, the garden, in just over a week - the cherries had deepened in colour

So I picked some - delicious

The bird of paradise had also flowered - quite stunning

Changed into my Summer overalls and recommenced weeding/trimming, filling up Gordon's trailer again.

Gordon also dropped over to say hello, and he reminded me to get rid of that pesky peppercorn growing near the house - so I did, got the pruning saw, and it's now gone (apart from the stump)

Gordon also suggested that he would bring his chain saw over one day and cut the jacaranda logs (that I had hand sawed) into fireplace sized pieces - good!

And then onto the phone, spoke to some soft flyscreens companies for the windows. Basically it's a velcro type system. I would be concerned that when the flyscreens aren't on the window, that you would see the velcro strip - and it could be quite unattractive. That said, one of the companies is posting some samples, so we'll see

Sent them photos of some of the windows - to see if they were appropriate

On Sunday it was supposed to be pretty hot, but it was overcast, and there were some heavy showers. I'd organised to go and have lunch with Carolyn C (who is living in Castlemaine) at a French cafe in Maldon. Food was ok, company much better. We still had to wear masks inside, (not when we were eating at the table though), and we now didn't have to wear masks outside anymore (unless you can't isolate)

After lunch traipsed through the shops - and found one where there was a glass artist. Took his card, maybe he might do our bathroom windows.

Carolyn and I also did a plant swap - she had brought a few little tomato & pumpkin plants for me and I had dug up a little almond tree - we'll see if it survives for her, as it was attached to a thick root, with not really any other roots

So had a lovely time catching up, and left Maldon around 4.30. Had seen a sign for a winery near Bell's Swamp, so turned off onto a dirt road in search of it. Well, that was pretty much the first and last sign that I saw for the winery - drove for about 15 minutes, and nothing, so had to turn around again empty handed.

Monday - and the electric radiator bloke came and had a look at the house, and the electrical situation. Sadly, we don't have enough electricity - 40 amps in - the normal is 63. This is because when we were having the house wired (not rewired) - the closest pole was this piddly 40amp one, while the pole across the road with more ampage was too far, so we would have had to put it (the wire) underground or something (very expensive). Anyway, this must be resolved if we are to get this heating. I must say that I like this electric radiator idea more than gas. The quote is approx $17,000 including installation - but we would need to organise the powerpoints or hard wiring. I had also got some gas hydronic heating quotes, and they were similar including installation - but we only have gas bottles, and they are 2-3 times as expensive as LPG. And of course LPG is a fossil fuel, and we should be moving away from it.

The radiator bloke also gave me details of a solar guy that he deals with - so I took photos of the switchbox, pole etc and sent to him. Didn't hear anything back from him, so rang up a solar bloke that Carolyn had recommended, and he was much more responsive, and in fact is coming over next Thursday.

Initially we thought that we could mount the solar panels on the ground (fence a bit of garden off) - as there is no way we would want them on our beautiful slate roof. However the solar bloke said it would be preferred to be elevated ie on a roof

Which led to my next call to a garage company - enquiring about a "garaport" ie carport with garage at the back. Seems pretty good, I was thinking of one that is 6m x 6m for the carport section, and the same again for the garage behind.

Measured it out near the back gate. Wouldn't be too intrusive -especially if we put vines etc around it

I asked for approximate costing - so that I could put into our budget - approx $6900 for the kit (zinc) or $8300 for colourbond. Then building is 33% of kit price, and concreting $88 per m2 . Therefore approx between $15,000 - $17000

So, this would need to be built before we could have the solar, before we could fire up the heaters (if we get the electrical radiators). Another thing I liked about the elcetrical radiators was that you could have heated towel rails as heaters in the bathrooms - lovely. And the fact that they are wifi, so we could turn them on when leaving Melbourne.

Anyway, that's a long way from now....

Stuart the renderer was supposed to start on Tuesday, however he had texted me the day before, saying that because of the rain he would start on Wednesday (which he did)

However, I had more than enough to keep me busy - the first kitchen person came and saw me at 9am - stayed close to 4.5 hours!!!, leaving around 1.30pm

She did detailed measurements of the kitchen and then also the scullery, and then put tracing paper on top, and talked through a few different options. She seemed very good

I suggested that we might use the kitchen sink that Jan and Peter had given us

And also the mahogany - maybe for the island bench top

After that, on with the overalls and more gardening - put a bird net on the cherry tree, and also unpacked the bookshelf, and collapsed down the dining table in the dining room

In the mean time, Stuart - and his assistants - Nick and David started. Set up the scaffolding outside the bay window, and got down to it.

Mark from Restoration Australia was also there to capture the action

They were making a bit of a mess of the outside of the windows - I hope they'll clean them when they've finished

I gathered together our indoor scaffolding pieces (haven't used it since the upstairs bathroom) - and asked Stuart and Mark to help me set it up in the dining room.

You need more than one person to set it up as you need to put the wheels in the end pieces, and then attach cross braces to the two end pieces

Once constructed and stable, I could put the 2 x decks down on top, or so I thought.....

Now, this scaffold is I think 1.8M high, so taller than me. I got the first deck piece in alright, but struggled with the 2nd, as I got the hook part stuck under the top, and couldn't get it out.... Having my arms outstretched above my head and holding what was rapidly becoming a heavy deck put me in a pickle. and yes, Mark was filming it. I tried fixing it up a few times, but no success, so I finally asked him to put down the camera and just help me....he did

And then up the scaffold - the outer layer of wallpaper (looks like hessian, and darker framing boxes) came off very easily in long strips. at this rate I would be finished rather quickly.

However, obviously it wasn't that easy.....as the inner green floral wallpaper was much more adhesive, and was rather difficult to just scrape off. I did have a hand held steamer, but that didn't work too well, so then I went lo fi, and just had a bucket of water and a large sponge, and this worked remarkably well

I already knew that there was the green floral wallpaper under the hessian one. But I also discovered a another lovely floral wallpaper which went from the skirting up approx 1m high

And meanwhile the blokes continued working outside

I had also re-taken Stuart on a tour of the house, to remind him what we wanted done....ie fix all of the external render, fix up the dining room and music room, and then the stairwell and garden room. Didn't bother with the kitchen or bathroom.

He subsequently told Mark that it was more than he had thought, and that they would now probably be there til mid to late January. This absolutely horrified me from a budget perspective - way back mid year I had spoken to Stuart, and he'd given a guestimate of 100- 120 hours or so - so around $8000, which is what we had budgeted for

They finished up in the afternoon, and Terry dropped in around 4.45pm. Given that it was close enough to 5pm, I offered him a G&T. We were just about to go outside when there was a knock at the door. Greg, the local artist who I had been trying to get hold of had come to see what I wanted (I'd visited, called, and texted - no response). So Terry went and drank his drink outside, and I chatted with Greg about my mad mural plan. Then about 20 minutes later, there was another knock at the door. This time it was Gary the heritage expert and his wife Elaine - come to inspect the supposed rising damp around the fireplace... so Greg went out to join Terry, while I was with Gary and Elaine

Gary tested the salt and damp content, and didn't think it was too bad....but said that all of the old concrete (not plaster/mortar) had to come off. He also volunteered to come and help fix up a few of the sash windows in January - as the Sean chippie he had recommended a while back, was just too busy to assist. I thought that was extraordinarily nice of him

They left around 7.30 or so

Thursday, and yet another bloke came and gave me a quote on cooling - evaporative cooling for upstairs, and split systems for our bedroom, dining room and music room. He was a plumber also - so apparently knew what he was talking about. Came back the next day with the quote - approx $7400 for the evaporative cooling for all of upstairs, and $7800 for the 3 x split systems. Stuart the renderer was not impressed with the idea of cutting holes in the ceiling for the evaporative cooling - ie more of the ceiling could fall down. and James the plumber/quoter had said - "all care, but no responsibility..."

I also had a quiet word with Stuart re the revised timings. I had advised Justin of the increased timings/budget, and we both agreed to go back to the original brief ie fix up the render and the internal cornices - and we'll do the cracks etc

Stuart was very understanding - he knows that we have a budget, and other priorities also - ie a kitchen/bathroom etc. he also suggested that another plasterer he knows could do the cornices for us (and he charges less than Stuart too). while Stuart and his blokes would concentrate on building back the blown walls etc. Stuart was going to call the bloke and see if he's interested. Fingers crossed that he is - as I really want to go on recommendations. haven't heard back as yet

Here is some of their outside progress

Also had 3m2 of mulch delivered by John C. They have a mill, and this is the by product, didn't have a chance to spread it out as yet

So I did more wallpaper stripping - they told me to change tack - and start on the wall opposite where the organ was. I did so - and found that a lot of that part of the wall was blown - so that it had to come down

Mark filmed me taking great loose chunks off the wall.

And the opposite wall between the window and the fireplace also had to come down. Some of the plaster had already been removed months ago - when the underpinning was done, because of the large crack there

I was somewhat surprised when I came back to have a look and found both sections of wall completely stripped back to bare bricks - and David spraying the walls down with water - as they have to be damp in order for the mortar to adhere properly

I thought it was unusual that the top courses of bricks look different from those below ie smoother/cleaner

And, unfortunately, the wall part of the cornice fell down on this section of the wall, so it will need to be made up from scratch using a template (although Stuart said that a plaster store might have that type (fingers crossed)

They kept a piece for that, and I also kept a piece to assist in matching up the paint colours

They'd finished up around 2.45, and asked me to get rid of the rubble for them - so they could have a fresh start early tomorrow morning (it was supposed to be very hot, so the plan was to arrive at 7am, and work inside)

And that was fine to ask me to clear up - we're paying them for their rendering not cleaning skills

I started picking up the bigger pieces by hand, but it was pretty slow, so got the shovel out, and chucked it out the window

I also saw that there was a wooden block in the wall on the right of the fireplace -instead of a brick

Couldn't figure out why it was there, but when I was clearing up, I spied a squashed conical piece of lead with a wire poking out - couldn't figure out what this was either. But some time later I remembered that there had seemed to be a servant bell depression under the wallpaper on that side of the chimney, so I figured it must be something to do with the servant bells.

However, back to the huge piles of rubble

From this to

this (actually not quite finished in the below photo)

and then the piles from the other walls

Terry had called some time earlier to invite me up for a drink around 5pm, - but I didn't know if I was going to finish in time.....

Here is the pile out the dining room bay window

And the rubbish bin full of wallpaper and rubble from the other window pile

Well it took about 2 hours - and I pretty much got it done - and gratefully drove up to Kingower for a well deserved G&T - delicious! Only had to do a little bit more sweeping up when I got back to the house

David had said they'd be back again at 7am on Friday morning - but they were here before 6.30am! - Very industrious, I saw the car through the kitchen window when I was having breakfast

I had planned to leave around 10am this morning (as Fraser wanted the yabby nets for his weekend at the Murray with friends)

So I pottered around - watering some of the plants - unfortunately, Carolyn's pumpkins look like goners

But the tomatoes have survived thus far

I was also pleasantly surprised to see that the little kiwi fruit that I'd bought in Warrnambool was actually alive, so gave all of them a good water,

Put some plumber's tape around the watering pipe for the little fig. I'd seen it split last week, and cut off the end and thought I'd fixed it, but it resplit

Gave the grape vines another good watering

And picked more cherries, and artichokes (which were perhaps over ripe), and took some photos of some that were well past their best for eating/picking

Took a photo of the broken metal vent in the bathroom - as the previous owners had made a hole in it to get out the previous mystery toilet's stink pipe. Gary had said that he collects them, so I'll see if he has an appropriate spare one