Learning to float.

When you embark on a project, you never really know where the road may take you. The roadblocks and detours you might come across. But that's life. Full of twists and turns. At the time you may wonder 'why this is happening to us?" It feels like unnecessary hardship.

And then comes hindsight. We are bearly at the beginning of our build and as we move incrementally forward, we realise that the road is far from smooth.

Following on from my last post, our builder has informed us that unfortunately he will not be able to start our project for another year or so. He has committed to another build also and he only has $500K insurance, so he can only take on one build at a time. The other project was ready to go before ours so we were left to wonder, what now?

We are here partially because our drafty has let us down again and again with the amount of time taking to finish our drawings. We also took a long time to choose our windows, swinging between aluminium, uPVC and aluclad.

AND, everything just takes so damn long!

So with all of that said, we are now going down the owner builder path. It's not really something we've considered before. The main reason being that we had secured our builder, and he was very happy for Pete to work alongside him. That would save us money and we'd have the flexibility to choose all our own materials (second hand or new) and put Pete's large range of skills to good use. Secondly, we were under the impression that if we went owner builder, the building surveyyor/inspector would scruitinise the living daylights out of everything we do (which will probably be the case) and also, Pete didn't feel confident that he was capable of the challenge, at that stage.

We know being owner builders is not the easy road. It will be challenging at times and there's no doubt we will make mistakes. But we feel confident that this is our way forward. We did not even consider looking for another builder. We know that not many builders would allow you to work along side them with such flexibility. This way Eric (our builder) can work for us as a contractor when he's not working on his other build, so we'll still have the expertise that we'll need from him. Pete also has a lot of contacts in the building industry, having worked in that field since he was 17, many moons ago, so they will invaluable.

We've embraced this setback as a big learning experience. Pete's taken on the challenge with gusto and is doing an amazing job of getting quotes from trades, liasing with plumbers, Barwon Water, The NBN, electricians and working through the councils long list of requisites to getting our building permit. The original title also needed to be updated (it was in an old format) so our subdivision can be finalised. To be owner builders, we must have the title in our name, then we can work through the online course as well as other boxes that will need to be ticked.

Since my last update we've had our electricity pit put in, barwon water have connected our water (complete with nice little tap in our front yard), and literally on Friday just passed, the plumbers completed ours and Adrians (Petes dad) new sewer lines. A huge, very messy job but a very exciting step closer to beginning our build. We've finalised our order for our aluclad windows which are coming from Europe and we're having some issues around the engineering of our outdoor pergola area which will need to be recitifyed but the most exciting news is that we've finally had our plans lodged with our building surveyor for review!

They will more than likely have some feedback or recommendations for us before we get our permit but it's a huge step forward for us and we're starting to believe that one day we will actually build our own home!!

If there's one thing I've learned with this situation it would be that choosing the path of least resistance feels like the right path. It's less stessful for one, and sometimes the universe is trying to lead you in a different direction, and if you are hellbent on going the opposite way, it can be a very difficult path. And so we choose to surrender. Let what will be be. Soften to lifes curve balls, and let them take their own course.

I'll write my next post sooner as there's a lot happening.

Bye for now,

Nat x

ps. I now have my own domain name and the address is:

https://www.theseedhouseblog.com so feel free to head there at any point to read some of my earlier posts.

Above: L to R: The new sewer line though Adrians back yard (it was 3 metres deep!) Looking out into the lane through where Adrians side fence was. Looking down the lane towards Marshall street, after the boys had finished with our block on the left.

Below: I needed to give you a pretty photo!

A magnificent wander through Eastern gardens. Photo of Meg and her fur babies Daisy and Lenny :) And me and Rubes of course! Photo curtesy of Alli Kristiansen.