(Not quite 50) shades of grey: exterior house colours

I am living vicariously through several friends who are embarking on medium to large scale

renovations. One of my friends is about to have the exterior of her Queenslander painted, and 

we have been talking about colour shemes. I wrote here about choosing the 

colour scheme for the old girl, and it's much nicer thinking about this when the pressure is off .....

I think I am enjoying the process a lot more than my friend is!

We both love all the shades of grey that are popular right now. She has decided on

a medium grey, with the verandah railings and the window sills a glossy black.

It's funny how once you start looking at certain colours, you see them everywhere. These

are just a few from the streets around the old girl:

 This is really white but the contrast with the darker trims is 

stunning. There are some black and white striped exterior blinds

along one side of this house and it looks fabulous. 

 in real life this is a greenish grey 

 another beauty just around the corner. I was mortified when 

the owner came from behind the fence with the lawn mower

 while I was surreptitiously taking a photo. He was actually very 

flattered and wrote down the paint colours for me - the main 

colour is Flint Smoke and the trim is Western Myall. 

 same house - I love the dark front door

 another lovely grey 

this is one of my favourite local houses - it's a 

beautiful soft grey with crisp white trims

I know that colours schemes come in and out of fashion, but somehow I think all 

these shades of grey will stand the test of time. I guess we will have to wait

and see.

And an update on the chicken front - still no eggs. 

Two blog posts in three days - I need to have a lie down!

xx

some photos from the archives: the old girl in the 90's

When I started this blog, I recounted here how it all started in 1995, with the first wave of renovations, and about how I seemed to have lost all my photos from that time.

As luck would have it, while unpacking boxes this week - and trying not to focus on the fact that over 3 months in, we are still unpacking boxes - I found some photos that chronicle some of the

initial renovations. They are all pre-digital and I have no idea where the negatives are, so I have taken photos of the photos - a bit grainy, but they were an amazing trip down memory lane for me.

this was what the old girl looked like when we bought her.

There were three flats and six sets of stairs. The verandahs had

all been closed in, and there was a big tree in the front garden

that we removed fairly quickly.

another view of the house

one of the first priorities after settlement was to build a fence

as we had dogs

me with one of the dogs sitting on the old stairs.

we had opened up the verandahs by that stage.

verandah railings starting to go up

restumping

new roof

The old roof was like a patchwork quilt of many

colours and we could always pick out the house when

we flew into Brisbane over our suburb

this was our kitchen for about six months. It was pretty hard

but much easier in your twenties with no children

than it would have been now.

The main thing I see when I look at this is the Nescafe Gold Blend -

the coffee culture has ensured that most of us now have coffee machines

of some description at home - I can't honestly remember the last time

I would have bought instant coffee. The second thing is the

prominently placed cockroach baits and spray - we certainly

needed it :(

this was the "new" kitchen under construction - how marvellously

luxurious it seemed to have a proper stove top, oven, and

running water.

this is the old girl looking lovely in about 1999 - freshly painted.

Exterior looked lovely, interior was about to get a revamp and sadly

our relationship ended, and it took a long time until this current

renovation took place.

fast forward to 2011 - how much the hedge has grown.

The Poinciana planted in 1997 is well established, as is the Jacaranda

on the footpath. The house is hardly visible.

another view of the old girl - March 2012

What a journey!

six weeks on ..... the good and the not so good

On the one hand I can't believe where the past six weeks have gone - probably something to do with the denial that comes from having to go back to work tomorrow - and on the other hand it feels as if we have been back in the old girl forever and this is just the way she always was. We are making a list of little things that we need our builder to come and finish off now that we have lived in the house for a few weeks and know a bit more how we are going to use the house. Compiling the list made me reflect on what things have worked well and what I would do differently - being such a novice to this whole thing.

We love the height of our kitchen bench tops. The standard is 900 mm and we had to convince our builder that we wanted ours at 950 mm. We are both tall and wanted to build a kitchen for us rather than for someone who might buy the house. It's the only thing we (politely) disagreed with our builder on - but I am glad we did.

I have had these antique scales for ages and love

having them on the bench

We have a rumpus area downstairs - I wanted polished concrete rather than tiles, and while it ended up being more expensive (doesn't everything end up being more expensive than planned) I love it: easy to clean, cool in summer, and looks great.

We have lots of storage space which is fantastic - especially for a Queenslander as they are notorious for not having convenient places to store all the day to day "stuff". It's much easier to keep everything looking neat when surfaces are clear.

The laundry chute still makes me smile every time I gleefully throw something down it (though boy of the house likes to throw "surprises" down there for me - the favourite this week was the toothpaste tube. Luckily it didn't make it into the washing machine....)

We maximised air flow and cross ventilation, and our longest stretch of verandah is along the whole north eastern aspect of the house. I never used to pay much attention to this sort of thing, and remember mercilessly teasing a friend of mine who used to turn up at open houses with his compass to check the orientation of the house. He has had the last laugh now though..... we enjoy lovely breezes and are relatively protected from the western sun.

this shot was taken just before we moved in. We leave the

little windows above the bi-fold doors open most of

the time to catch the breezes.

The timber features in the house are what I think makes it beautiful - I have previously posted about this - I am glad we included all of these features but wish we had more of them.

Some of the things I would do differently......

I think if there was ever a next time, I would pay a lot more attention to detail. We had a few issues along the way and if I had looked more closely at measurements they could have been avoided before we reached the building stage. Our main bathroom has ended up lovely, but it's a bit more cosy than I envisaged, and we almost couldn't fit a normal sized bath in there.

the bath is almost touching the shower screen

Our gas stovetop has been fitted to be very close to the splash back - it means that it is hard to fit a larger pan or Le Creuset on the back burners without it coming into contact with the tiles:

the space is about 2 cm. We didn't notice this until a few days

after moving in when we started to cook. It works but is

irritating when you are using a larger pot.

I had so much on my mind about the completion of the renovation and the move back in that I completely forgot about curtains/blinds/window coverings. We have been sleeping in the bedrooms with sheets or doona covers taped to the walls and window frames with blue masking tape. Not the homely look I was aiming for! The man of the house has an office downstairs - we wanted to save some money by getting ready made blinds for that room, anticipating we would get custom made ones in due course for the bedrooms. To our dismay we realised that the windows down there, along with the rest of the house, are a non - standard size. I love our windows, they are all timber and were made especially for us - but I hadn't realised or asked about standard sizes.....so we will have to get all of our blinds especially made. Another lesson learned.

our bedroom with window covering aka spare mattress

trying to block the morning sun - adds a certain "je ne sais quoi".

Large double hung windows are lovely but not

at 5:19 am with no blinds when the sun rises :(

We have frameless glass shower screens in all the bathrooms - they look fantastic but how can you keep them clean - other than cleaning them after every shower? Our builder recommended this product:

this is what they use to keep car windscreens so clean and

shiny in the car dealers. I am sure it would do the job but my little

inner greenie voice tells me that the chemicals can't

be good for you when you are exposed to them every day

in your shower. Maybe Shannon Lush has some tips?