Stuck With It

After lots of heated discussion it looks like we are stuck with the finish on the pool unless we pay another $7000 to upgrade to the glass finish that we know we choose even though it is not written down anywhere. The pool company are not even saying that it is possible that they could have made a mistake and the boss from Queensland Family Pools blatantly lied saying he doesn't even carry the samples of the glass finishes in his case. Funny that when we saw them when he came for his consultation. he knows he has stuffed up but is too arrogant and stubborn to admit it and obviously it is our fault for not double checking and knowing what it was we ordered. I pointed out to him then if he doesn't carry the glass samples with red in it how did we know it existed and that that is what we thought we had decided on when we had never seen it in the first place? He had no answer to this. I despise liars and people who can not admit that yes perhaps a mistake has happened.

We are not trying to get something for nothing we just wanted the finish we know we picked. We are kind of backed into a corner now as there isn't another $7k in our budget as the bank were covering the cost of the pool in our loan so I guess the only option now is to see what the water looks like once the chemicals are run through it today and move on with life. Hopefully it is dark blue and not pale as I can probably life with that. Lesson to self - don't simply trust that because someone is good at making pools that they are good with paperwork and transferring what was discussed on to your contract. I'm more annoyed at myself than anything because all along I had a feeling something wasn't right but I let it go rather than pursuing it and now its come back to bite me on the bum. Fingers crossed we like it once its all done, however I do feel like holding back the final measly $1000 just to be spiteful but that isn't the true me at work. I did tell him that I know and really he knows that he has stuffed up and that karma will take care of it.

On a more positive note the lawn has been laid by the turf company and looks beautiful, what lovely guys there were too. Sandy slightly over ordered what we needed so we have got lawn in places we didn't intend to but for now but it does look lovely and will keep the weeds at bay. Now we simply have to give it a good watering in so lots of fun to have playing in the sprinklers.

It's going to be a very low key Christmas, a quite one at home some simple food and plenty of rest, taking time to enjoy our new home and even the pool!! Oh but we better buy and assemble the BBQ from Masters first.

Swimming By Christmas?

We might be in our pool if the rain holds off or eases up long enough to firnish the pavers. They had it 80% finished yesterday then the fencing is scheduled to start Monday but everyone is behind due to the weather. If the pebblecrete gets done on the 22nd as planned at least we can put water in throw in some chlorine a have a swim. The pool guys will then come in the new year to do the chemical set up for real. Here's hoping for some warm sunny days as we also have booked the bobcat, top soil and turf to come this week.

Telstra finally connected the phone and the technician came out to look at the oven, it was a loose wire to the fan so it wasn't cooling down- nice simple fix thankfully.

We are starting to list things for our 90 day service - so far its only minor things like stains or marks on the paintwork but there is one thing that has me confused the toilets full and half flush buttons are on different sides in our toilet to the others so I'm not certain they have been fitted properly, this will be going on the list.

Glorious Garage Door

Well it is official we are supremely happy with our choice of panel lift garage door and the colour as now we have seen it in real life we personally think the dune works great with the bricks. Phew and double phew as we are having the cladding painted to match and the downpipes and the water tank so it would be disastrous if we decided we hated it.

The cladding boards have been delivered and are currently lying down on the driveway covered in black plastic.

Here are some happy snaps.

Garage Door - Colorbond Dune

Close Up

Inside

Cladding Delivered

Cladding Boards

Brickies and Unexpected Arrival

The brick layers are back in town and have been very busy, when we arrived on site this morning they had nearly finished the 4 brick columns in the outdoor room and were frantically sending loads more bricks up the conveyor belt on to the scaffolding ready to do more work on the upper story.
Had a quick peek through the windows but it didn't look like we'd had anything else delivered to site yet.....

Brick Piers

Brick Piers Near Completion

The SS rang me later on today and told me the garage door is on. (Already!?) [no photos yet I couldn't get back on site today]. He also informs me the bricks will take about one more days work and then we will be at enclosed stage. That means Metricon will be wanting a very big chunk of money soon.
I asked him about how under the stairs will be finished and it turns out this will be boarded and will have a door on it so we will have a nifty storage space, cool! seeing as we had no idea about that as there is no indication on our set of plans.

The carpenter is back on Monday to start on the exterior cladding and the inside joinery and hopefully the kitchen cabinets will arrive the same day. I asked if he could give us a rough estimate of a finish date he explained he couldn't at this stage but said that once the painter starts it would normally then be another 6 to 7 weeks. Will we be in before Christmas? Most definitely will be (yes! yes! and yes!) and if not he has told us we can stay at his house so he must be very confident it will be completed by then.

We have been pondering what mail box we can have as we'd like something quite contemporary. However as we are not allowed to do any construction in the nature covenant at the front of the land we will only be able to have a post going into the ground, hmmm not much scope there then when you see what they have in the local hardware stores! Some serious web surfing later and we have come across these designs by a company in Noosa, what do you think?