Goodbye Winter + Hello Spring

I don't know where the year has gone and can't quite believe we are now in September which means we have officially said goodbye to Winter and hello to Spring!

 

 

Goodbye Winter and to rainy days and cold nights spent inside keeping dry and warm by the heater, slow cooked comfort food and endless pots of soup on the stove, wearing uggies, boots and scarves, squeaky windscreen wipers on the car, and trying to dry clothes by hanging them up all around the house!

 

 

Hello Spring and the warm sunshine making an appearance again, the garden comes alive with flowers and the herbs are sprouting, more fresh seasonal foods and salads on the menu at home, the layers of clothing slowly come off, more walking and less driving, more entertaining at home and things to do outdoors.

I'd have to say that Spring is my favourite season of year!

 

What do you love about Spring?

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[All images via my Pinterest - 1, 2, 3]

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Whats Old Wrinkly And Sagging In Places

Ceilings are just like the elderly over time they grow old and wrinkly which is nothing to be ashamed of it's a sign of a good long life ... Having said that our ceilings could do with a bit of a face lift to straighten out those wrinkles and sagging!

 

When we renovated the Living Room we attempted a DIY ceiling lift because it was sagging in parts. It was a full on job that took us a few days to do but the bonus was it cost us less than $100. While we fixed some of the sagging it wasn't perfect and the wrinkles no matter how much we sanded them we couldn't get rid of them.

 

Our DIY ceiling lift in the Living Room

So when we did the Kitchen we decided that lifting the ceiling wasn't going to work if we wanted it to be smooth and new like the rest of the room the whole ceiling had to be replaced. Another factor was the holes that were cut out of the old ceiling for the old stove vent and the pantry when we knocked it down would need to be patched which wouldn't look too good. So we had no choice really we had to install a brand spanking new ceiling.

 

The old ceiling before the pantry was knocked out

Now we could have attempted to install a new ceiling ourselves but we have so many other jobs to do on the kitchen renovation that it just wasn't feasible to attempt this job as well. But as always we did the prep work ourselves which was to remove the old cornices ... if you can at least do some of the demo work yourself you'll save yourself some money.

Mr P removing the old cornices

The old ceiling sheets had handles so they could hang them up to dry!
 

All the old cornices and vents removed

We left the new ceiling install to our roof carpenter who built our garage roof and ceiling. It was a 2 day job for him which was spread over a few weeks, he put the new ceiling up and then once the kitchen was installed he came back and put the cornices in. Mr P helped him put the cornices in so we could get a discount and we saved $400 by helping and paid $1500 in the end for a totally new plaster board ceiling installed in the kitchen and dining area with cornices cut out around all the kitchen cupboards and 2 plaster corner vents for the dining room corners to match the vents throughout the house.

 

On day 1 the new ceiling was put up sheet by sheet underneath the old ceiling in the kitchen and dining area. It was good news to hear we didn't need to remove our old ceiling - could you imagine the 40+ years of dust and crap that would fall through if we had cut out the old ceiling to put the new one in? Yea it wouldn't have been pretty!



Ceiling cement was mixed up and used to install the ceiling boards

New plaster boards installed under the old ceiling

A few weeks later once the new kitchen was installed the roof carpenter came back to finish off the ceiling and Mr P was his helper for the day. All the new lights that we just had installed had to be removed so the new ceiling could be prepped and sanded. Cornices were cut out to fit and installed all the way around the ceiling around the new kitchen cupboards. We also had 2 ornate plaster corner vents fitted into the corners of the dining room so it looks the same as the old ceiling.

 

The cornices cut to size and ready to go up

 

New cornices going up around the kitchen cupboards

 

Cornices going along the walls

 

More cupboards to cut around - note the hole left for the range hood

 

All cornices finished

 

Installing the ornate corner cornices

So there you go all the ceiling cornices are neat and fitted and there's no more gaping holes in the ceiling. Having holes in the ceiling for weeks and with Winter upon us now it was really getting a bit draughty and we were losing the warmth from the gas heater too quickly!

 

Now we can get the paint brushes out and paint the ceiling and cornices ... After all the projects we've tackled in this kitchen renovation painting is going to be a walk in the park! 

 

For updates on the kitchen as I go Like Jarrah Jungle on Facebook and you'll never miss a thing!

Sharing with link up parties:
Wow Us Wednesdays at Savvy Southern Style
Make It Pretty at The Dedicated House
 

 

[All images my own]

 

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Friday's Letters - Dear Birthday

I'm just that bit older this Friday ... older but not quite sure about the wiser bit! I'm sharing my Friday's Letters with Ashley at The Sweet Season head on over here to link up your letters too.

 

I'm imagining I'm writing this weeks letters from this eclectic home office sitting back in the outdoor chair feasting on leftover Birthday cake and a shot of espresso.

 

Dear Birthday - Another year older and another year I'm shown how special my friends, family and Mr P are to me .... spoilt with flowers, cake, gifts and a surprise visit from my brother. I'm feeling the love xxx

 

Dear Lexi - Week 17 and I have taken you on your first walk with me all on my very own. Apart from you nearly choking the entire way just so you could walk in front of me to sniff out the bushes I think I did ok.

 

Dear Kitchen Reno - This weekend we have the brickie coming over to help cut out the window and brick it into a doorway ready for the french doors to be installed. We're at the half way mark now 3 weeks without a kitchen and 3 more weeks to have it all ready for the new kitchen to be installed. We can do it!

Dear Saturday Night's Cross Dress Party - Why do men love to dress up like women? They can't stop grabbing their fake oranges as boobs and lifting their skirts to show off their stocking legs! Saturday night's party is going to be a hoot!

Dear Autumn Weather - I'm loving the cooler temperatures and listening to the rain when I'm inside all safe and warm. The change of seasons means the heater has made an appearance and so have my ugg boots!

Dear 3 Year Blog-versary and A Giveaway - Next week I'll have had this blog for 3 years WOW time has flown I didn't know I'd still be writing about my renovating journey 3 years on! I also have a Giveaway to share with you guys so stay tuned for more details :-)

Head over here to join in this weeks Friday's Letters

[Image via my Pinterest]
 

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Point and Shoot: Upmarket at UWA

When: Sunday, 24 June 2012 @ 3pm

Where: Upmarket at UWA Gardens, Crawley

I made the most of the break in the cold winter days we've been  having and spent a sunny Sunday afternoon at the beautiful University of Western Australia where the Upmarket was on. I use to want to go to this Uni just to experience the UWA gardens, there are always weddings and events being held here it is so beautiful.

The Upmarket is held about every 3 months and is a showcase for all WA designers there was fashion, jewellery, kids stuff, stationary, bags, relishes and jams, so many things to look at. I bought myself some cookbooks which were taken by a WA photographer Lustre Publications and has stunning photos and recipes, some cool posters from Mokoh Designs I'm going to frame for gifts and some cute yellow rose stud earrings. I couldn't resist a take home pack of Cookie Dough Cookies they were so rich and indulgent, some banana and coconut chutney that is meant to go nice with curry, and some tomato chutney mmmm I love my savoury sauces. 

I went with my bestie and her little boy (in the snaps above and below) and I'm not a coochicoo kid type of person but I am tempted to steal this one somedays he's such a cool little dude :)

As for the rest of my weekend it was very quiet, I haven't been been feeling too crash hot so pretty much spent the whole time on the couch by the heater. The renovations continue outside and the renderer finished the garage (woo hoo) and Mr P got more work done on the roof. I'll share some progress photos with you soon. 

How was your weekend? What did you get up to?

Why not share your weekend over at Sunny + Scouts linkup Point and Shoot

[All images my own]

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Why You Shouldn't DIY With The Heater On!

If your varnishing the floorboards in the freshly painted study with super stinky Tung Oil and then shut the door and windows so no dust falls onto said glistening wet floorboards then DO NOT turn on your gas heater! Why?

? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? 

We couldn't work out why our brand new heater was letting off a strong kerosene smell each time it was turned on. So making use of the 5 year warranty we rang the friendly folk at Rinnai and spoke to 3 people who all asked the same question "Have you been renovating, using paints etc".

Turns out the gas heater will emphasise any chemical smells in the house and as we'd been painting all weekend + doing the floors = yes this combination was definitely a problem.

So the solution? 

Open all the windows and doors for the cold winter winds to blow through and let the fresh air in and the chemicals out. Problem solved! Now it's been 3 days we are back to cranking up that heater even more to warm the now freezing house back up again!

Probably common sense, but these little things seem to stump you at the time. Just another misadventure in the Jarrah Jungle renovations!

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Nature's Humour

I was making the most of the sunny (but cold!) days before the forecast rains came and washed my favourite new doona and luxurious 1000 thread count sheets and threw them on the line to dry.

 I'm sure the birds were laughing in their chirps as I approached the line to see if they were dry. Oh they were dry alright. And tainted. The birds decided to leave a few birdy poos on the sheets AND doona.

So back in the machine they went and drying inside by our awesome new heater this time without the threat of nature's humour!

Here's our line (and Aussie icon 'Hills') out in the elements all vulnerable! The bird lure I'm pretty sure is the neighbour's olive trees over the fence. I'm not keen on using a dryer, so think when we redo our backyard we should find a spot for a new line undercover (another thing to add to the ever growing wishlist!)

 

[Image my own]

 

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Winter Warmer

This is the first winter we’ve been in our house and it’s been freezing cold lately, not just in the early morning or night but allllllllllll day long now! I thought the new roof insulation together with my little electric heater and ugg boots would be enough, but no we DEFINATELY need something to take the chill out the air! We had the option when we had the air conditioner put in to get reverse with heating but for an extra $8,000 it was way too extravagant.

So on the weekend we decided to make use of the gas points in the house and go get a shiny new gas heater. It was the quickest purchase so far, we wanted the Rinnia Avenger 25 in sexy silver and went to the usual competitors Kambos, Harvey Norman and lastly The Good Guys who won us over (they always do) by reducing their price the most to beat the others ‘best price’ by $100. Went straight home and plugged it in and the house temp showed a freezing 11 degrees, not for long though it now cranks at a toasty 20 degrees. So far it’s working great covers a really big area. Now just need to set the timer on it to turn on before my alarm goes off to make getting out of bed that bit more bearable!

So how do you keep warm in winter ... More blankets? Wood fire? Hot chocolate? Share your winter warmer thoughts ....

[Images via Rinnia]

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