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Housekeeping

Find cleaning advice from other Mumsnetters on our Housekeeping forum.

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Original poster

building a house

28 replies

Bethanne · 19/10/2006 10:51

After living in many cramped places for many years, we are actually building our own home. With 5 kids I am really looking forward to a bit more space. The kids range from 15 years old to 9 months old. We are now making decisions about interior things. Any advice on 'must haves' while there is still time? I don't want to think of good ideas when it is too late to include them!

OP posts:

mysticpeaks · 19/10/2006 11:25

Carefully consider the stairs. Ours are really narrow, steep and have nowhere to put a standard stairgate at the top. Nightmare when tring to get big 1 yr old lump downstairs!! Try to plan the back garden to open into a utility room/kitchen (muddy footprints) Plenty of plug sockets for some reason babies and children require so many things that need plugging in and there are never enough sockets. Internal doors. I would go for glass (safety obviously) paned ones. Everyone always said to me ooh no dangerous, but how many times have you opened a door to find one of your little ones right behind it (may just be me and dd who currently obsessed with closing doors on me!) Hope non of this comes across as patronising.
Big family kitchen - got to be a must!! (that really was obvious - sorry will go now)

MegaLegs · 19/10/2006 11:27

A laundry chute! With 5 kids you must have even more washing than me (with 4). It sounds trivial but a friend has a laundry chute from the upstairs bathroom to the utility room and I'm v.jealous.

bctmum · 19/10/2006 11:28

Three bathrooms

mysticpeaks · 19/10/2006 11:35

Oh underfloor heating is brilliant. Its cheaper to run. No radiators for los to bump inot/burn themselves on. You can heat each room individually. If you have digital termostats you can set them to come on if the room falls below a certain temp. Ideal for babies as you can have a cosy room without having to worry about their room becoming too hot. It heats the whole room instead of just one corner. We installed our own its not that hard really. Only drawback is that it has to be fitted before carpets and then electician has to come and do the last bit, but if you're starting from scratch that won't be an issue.

MellowMonsta · 19/10/2006 11:43

Somewhere to hide the toys. We have no cupboards in boys bedroom and it is a bit of a nightmare.

throckenholt · 19/10/2006 11:57

internet connections (eg cat 5) in rooms ? Much easier to do it up front than to try and add it later.

Cupboard space.

Utility room.

QueenQuootieSpookypieBee · 19/10/2006 12:02

im very

Playroom/snug? Then you can keep your living room nice and tidy If I built my own house, id have a massive kitchen/diner with room for a sofa and TV and have that as the main room/playroom etc. With an open fire...

Original poster

Bethanne · 19/10/2006 14:00

Thank you for all your great ideas. I'm very grateful! Was thinking of underfloor heating and am glad to hear positive reviews on it. What about floor coverings over it. Which is best, tiles, laminate, wood, carpet?

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CreepyCrawlyCarmenere · 19/10/2006 14:02

We had a laundry shoot when I was a child, although my brother did get stuck in it and the cat had kittens in it, still great idea though!

USAUKMum · 19/10/2006 14:11

Why not just have your laundry upstairs?? We had our washer & dryer upstairs in our house growing up. Also space to hang up washing indoors for some items.

Also definately go for the underfloor heating !!!

LizP · 19/10/2006 19:26

We have underfloor heating under wooden floor, rubber floor, limestone and ceramic tiles and it all works really well. The only thing I think it doesn't work under is carpet.

We have a second, kids height hand rail on our stairs which I think is great.

Did see a design mag once with big holes in the family room floor - they were pits with benchs round the outside edge - during the day they were open and the kids could play with toys, in the evening the toys could just be bunged in and the tops put back on - kind of like a sand pit in a deck. I thought they looked fab.

Tickle · 19/10/2006 19:37

Lots of great ideas!

While you've got a digger there, get them to dig a hoel in the garden so you can sink a trampoline to ground level

As a child we lived in an old cottage with 2 sets of stairs. It was brilliant for hide & seek Most new houses don't have enough nooks and crannies IMO!!

Make that utility room BIIIGGG.

BettyBatShapedSpaghetti · 19/10/2006 19:48

Our house has an unconventional lay-out and our utility room is on the same floor as the bedrooms. Its great not having to carry washing downstairs and then back up again.

Would also suggest/agree with:
lots of sockets
several phone points for flexibility
several TV aerial points (eg. in bedrooms if you/older children are likely to want TVs in rooms)
think carefully about lighting - the time to decide on whether to have central lights/wall-lights/downlighters etc is now,before rooms are wired and plastered
lots of built in storage

Original poster

Bethanne · 19/10/2006 20:34

I love the trampoline in the garden idea. No need for a safety net! Did you know that all upstairs bedrooms must now by law have fire escape windows. One of our children is a 9 year old who would climb anything. Statistically I would have thought he would be more likely to fall out of an upstairs window than be in a house fire!

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Original poster

Bethanne · 19/10/2006 20:37

By the way, what about the kitchen islands that are in all the mags now? Would you recommend one? I am thinking of putting the hob and oven in one and then having the other end overhanging like a breakfast bar. Then I can start the evening meal and supervise the homework at the same time.

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MegaLegs · 19/10/2006 20:42

Yes kitchen island is great. I have a hob at one end and then the rest is all work surface. I love it. Like you say can cook and watch kids at the table but also great when you're entertaining. Friends kind of stand round ours like a bar whilst I cook.

MegaLegs · 19/10/2006 20:44

There are so many crazy rules and regs from building standars now. Our upstairs windows are sash windows and to meet current fire safety regs they need to have a step, fixed to the floor under each one, but because this means a child might climb up and fall out they also have to have safety bars fitted on the outside!

sahmtotwo · 19/10/2006 20:46

How about one of those central vacuum cleaners? Where you just have plug like things in the wall and you just plug the hose in and it all goes through the walls to a collector in the utility/garage. I have always wanted one of these lol.

danceswiththedevil · 19/10/2006 21:03

Built in storage, built in storage, built in storage. I know someone has sort of mentioned it but we live in an old victorian house and we have NO built in storage anywhere, nowhere even to keep the vacuum!
Also I would love either a larder or one of those huge larder cupboards from the floor up. Our main food storage cupboard (small and high up) has a tendency to avalanche when you try and get things out.

Must say I'm so jealous, I'd love to build my own house.

Katymac · 19/10/2006 21:04

Oooo a proper larder with lots of shelves

LizP · 19/10/2006 21:04

If you are not a tidy family then I would suggest you have the work surface and breakfast bar on different levels - that way only the work surface or the breakfast bar gets covered in junk when people dump things as the walk past - somehow seems to stop it spreading too much.

Make sure all your cupboards go up to the ceiling - means they dont't get dirty on top and gives more storage space.

mysticpeaks · 19/10/2006 22:59

underfloor heating is fine under carpet. Ours is anyway. You need special underlay. The company we used was rayotec - check them out.

QueenQuootieSpookypieBee · 19/10/2006 23:03

MIL is getting underfloor heating - it goes under anything under 2.5 tog. The company shes using do the underlay stuff with the heating (theres carpet underlay aswell though)

QueenQuootieSpookypieBee · 19/10/2006 23:09

oooh, 2 sets of stairs! They are very fun - my friend had 2 sets and it was great!

If your pushing the boat out, she also had a double garage and ontop was a big empty room for parties etc., but would also make a GREAT teenagers room. I think it was on 2 slightly different levels. The stairs to it went from an inner hallway, with utility room and WC, the the 2nd set of stairs to upstairs (the secret stairs!)

Original poster

Bethanne · 20/10/2006 09:53

We are having a double garage with an upstairs, but it's detached. I don't know how we're going to heat it yet, cos the central heating boiler is planned to be in our cooker in the kitchen.

My utility room is quite small, but has large cupboards in it. Would love a laundry chute, had thought of it, but because we are using cement slabs at first floor level, it would be really expensive to fit.

We are building a big house, but will have to save money on the fitting it out part. Decided to go for space but will have to keep it simple to compensate costs.

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