That blue door is lovely!
4years - LOVE that blue!
rick - definitely ignore, ignore, ignore. What a bully that man is. He has no sense of decency!
titsy - So very, very well done! Do send us some pictures - I think your tolerance of the turquoise shows your real love for your DS!! I feel like you should receive some kind of trophy to mark this milestone.
And I am soooo jealous of Christmas in NYC. I have only ever been there in spring/summer, but I bet it is absolutely amazing in the winter. Talk about glamorous! I am sure you will sort out the difference with your builder - it sounds like it is a simple error he's made, so hopefully you won't even have to put on your assertive pants to sort it!
whatthefox - Thank you so much for your advice! I have had a very gentle word this morning about it, and they are going to sweep up at the end of the day. They are taking the largest wall in the hall back to brick so it is extremely messy. But it's in such an unbelievably awful state at the moment, drastic steps are necessary.
I have been saving up for 10 years to do our work, which has basically involved living in a horribly down-at-heel ex-rental house with plastic carpets for more or less a decade. I suspect my house is worlds cheaper than most of yours, though: the cost of the extension is more than 50% the value of the house! This is the kind of financial decision everyone advises you not to take - we will not add the same amount in value as this is costing, probably by £20-30k. However, we just couldn't find a house that suited us in our budget (which is small, even with the extension costs)- we live in a city that isn't very architecturally distinguished, and where people don't really care for their houses, very unlike the south east. So we decided to create the space that we actually needed and to design everything in so that we could have a very minimal and clean interior.
Since we haven't spent much on the house in the last decade, I think some of the costs we won't recoup are just things we would have had to do anyway for maintenance (new kitchen, staircase).
I think I might be able to start decorating this weekend! The little study at the back of the house is being patch plastered today and the skim coat is quite thin so I think it might be dry by Sunday. If not, I can definitely do the walls that aren't being touched, anyway, and finish up next week if need be. I've gone for Dulux China White in there as it's still a small, north-facing room even if it has a really big window now. 