The Cladding Begins!

It's been a while since the last report. Things have slowed down as Ben needed to go back to work, so time is a bit limited. Needless to say we have continued working on the interior - almost completing the cabling throughout the house, starting to put up some plasterboard, and finally getting the shower room ready for the tiler, only for the tiles to go missing just when we needed them. We are still hoping for a shower by Christmas, and if not it will be very soon after. We have made progress in terms of quality of living - we now have a very nice kitchen sink and bench top, which will be transferred to the laundry when we get a real kitchen. The toilet seat finally turned up! This week Ben, ably assisted by local chef Zafir started putting on the first cladding. Hebel is aerated concrete, and as the photos show is lifted into place then screwed to the wall. Eventually it will be rendered, but already looks quite good as it is. Four hours work saw them complete 24 square metres, so it's a lot quicker than laying blocks or bricks! Prior to that we had 18 sheep wander up our drive one day. They had escaped from one of the neighbours up the road so thought they'd check out the building site! Needless to say, they didn't make much of a dent in our overgrown paddock!