---
layout: ../../layouts/LayoutMdx.astro
title: Works 4
date: 2021-11-07
dir: work4
image: kitchenwoo2
description: it's all coming together
---

import { generateImageHyrdationFunction } from "../../utils";
export const s = generateImageHyrdationFunction("work4");
import Cards from "../../components/Cards.astro";
import Solocard from "../../components/Solocard.astro";
import NextPrev from "../../components/NextPrev.astro";
import Progress from "../../components/Progress.astro";
import YTVideo from "../../components/YTVideo.astro";

Wow! Things are moving quickly now! It's only been a week since the last update but it feels like there's a lot of visible progress.

## The Bathroom

A milestone has been reached! This room can be accurately referred to as a bath room now - a room with a bath in it! It's not yet plumbed in, but it's definitely in the room (and it's definitely a bath).

<Cards
  images={[
    { title: "Bath in a room!", src: s("bathroom0") },
    { title: "Tiling the monolith", src: s("bathroom1") },
  ]}
/>

We were particularly impressed that our builders remembered to put the bath in its place _before_ widening the monolith.

**Top Tip!** Don't bathblock yourself.

<Solocard title="Bathroom!" src={s("bathroom2")} />

The bathroom is now fully grouted and it makes so much of a difference - it feels polished, clean and beautiful. Add this to having proper light fittings and it's so nearly finished! We are really pleased with the lights but we didn't realise how bright the bulbs would be (they're only 7W). They might also feel even brighter than they are because we keep looking directly at them thinking 'hmm they look very bright don't they'.

The alcove lights have ended up being a bit more customisable than we really need - it means that we can have a 🕺 **disco bathroom party** 🕺 once it's all completed!

<Solocard title="Hmm they look very bright don't they 🤔" src={s("lights")} />

We're definitely in the final stretch now. Just missing a toilet, a sink, the handles and the glass. And the mirror. And one box of tiles. And the countertop. And and and... We're expecting these to mostly arrive/be installed next week.

One other thing that we're missing is decent water pressure. We're hoping to get a plumber round next week to decommission our header tanks in the loft and bring us up to mains pressure. At the moment the shower works but is a bit wimpy.

<Cards
  images={[
    { title: "Bathmonster", src: s("bath") },
    {
      title: 'Currently using the "Nozzy Dishwasher" drainage method',
      src: s("sink"),
    },
    { title: "Invisible toilet", src: s("toilet") },
    { title: "Toasty toes", src: s("underfloorHeating") },
  ]}
/>

When it's just a plan on paper it's hard to know how it'll feel in person. We are glad that it doesn't feel overmarbled, though it might look it! In the same vein (teehee) we are glad that the gap between the bath and the monolith is spacious enough to walk through comfortably. On paper it looks a lot closer, as the bath's low height isn't obvious 👍

## The Kitchen

Monday the 1st November came around and it was kitchen delivery day! They were happy to come up the garden and not be swatted in the face with thorns or overgrown bushes, though it might take a while for the grass to grow back...

<Cards
  images={[
    { title: "Half a kitchen in a van", src: s("van") },
    {
      title: "Happy kitchen fitters (it didn't rain tooo much)",
      src: s("garden"),
    },
  ]}
/>

Shaun, our fitter, is great. He's happy to be interrupted all the time with us asking all sorts of questions, and us fiddling about with the drawers and appliances as they go in. We repay him in lots of coffee ☕☕☕

The kitchen units were built in the workshop, so this week has been mainly Shaun putting everything in place and scribing units to the floor and walls, which meant everything went up really quickly!

<Cards
  images={[
    { title: "Protecting the floor", src: s("kitchen1") },
    { title: "End of day one - a load of carcasses", src: s("kitchen2") },
    { title: "Things are going up!", src: s("kitchen4") },
    { title: "One run up", src: s("kitchen5") },
    { title: "Starting on the island", src: s("kitchen6") },
    { title: "The same, from the back", src: s("kitchen7") },
  ]}
/>

We are so impressed with the quality of everything, and there's plenty of nice little touches that we wouldn't have thought of if we were building a kitchen ourselves.

<Cards
  images={[
    {
      title:
        "Magnetic back panel so you can access all the electrics once the top is on",
      src: s("magneticbackboard"),
    },
    {
      title:
        "Dimpled water mat under the sink to catch leaks before it soaks into the wood",
      src: s("undersinkmatting"),
    },
    { title: "Branded tape to hold everything together", src: s("tape") },
  ]}
/>

Yet another reason we're glad we didn't fork out to get the hob and dishwasher sooner is that they both unexpectedly appeared on time! Not sure what happened to the massive delay we were promised, but they are the correct models and hopefully(!) will work.

On Friday the bloke from the worktop company came out to template the quartz for our worktops. He had a very nifty tool for measuring things. Basically it's a laser rangefinder on a sensitive gimbal. Shaun was pretty chuffed when the island was pronounced to be only a single millimetre off being square.

<Solocard title="🎉 Tools are our favourite! 🎉" src={s("tool")} />

We're now allowed to start moving some stuff into the drawers. Shaun says that this is the point when people start forking out for all new pots/pans/cutlery/the works - but we're pretty happy with what we have 😄

<Cards
  images={[
    {
      title: "Shaun has given us some example drawer usage to get started",
      src: s("drawers"),
    },
    { title: "Load testing our new drawers", src: s("drawertesting") },
  ]}
/>

Our fridge-freezer (The **BEEG FREEDGE**) is due to appear on Monday but we won't be getting the electrics fitted for several days. The worktop is likely to arrive in another week or so. We are very excited for a big fridge-freezer - we will most likely fill it with local ice cream to celebrate as soon as it's plugged in!

As an inveterate fiddler, it's been terrible having our appliances in place but not powered up :(

<Cards
  images={[
    { title: "Woo!", src: s("kitchenwoo1") },
    { title: "!ooW", src: s("kitchenwoo2") },
  ]}
/>

It feels a bit hectic with two sets of tradespeople again - but this is the final stretch before we get our house back for a good while.

## Other things

We finally got new desks! Nikki's placeholder desk (the cheapest jankiest table from Ikea) was on the verge of collapsing any second from the weight of the monitors, so off we went to get bigger, better, less janky desks (still from Ikea). Given that we spend quite a large amount of time in our office, it's worth making sure that it's comfortable.

Nikki's new desk is one of those manual-handle sit-stand desks, so it can be cranked slightly higher than a normal desk.

Ozzy's desk is a bit more involved. He got a huge beautiful walnut worktop which goes on top of some useful drawers for storage.

<Cards
  images={[
    { title: "Nikki desk - clean and beautiful", src: s("nikkidesk") },
    {
      title: "Ozzy desk - cleaned especially for the photo and storagey",
      src: s("ozzydesk"),
    },
  ]}
/>

This means that Ozzy has finally been able to realise his dream of having a stationery drawer - no more searching through the house for a pen or sellotape.

### 🙀

Poor Shaun had a bit of a jumpscare one day - a loud banging/smashing noise and a cry from outside. He was very concerned that someone had tripped on our stairs and had horribly injured themselves.... however it turned out to be a neighbourhood cat scuffle and they'd somehow managed to explode our cat flap. It's letting a big breeze in now. Off to get a replacement then...

<Solocard title="Cat flap carnage" src={s("catflapcarnage")} />

On the whole, everything is coming together so well that each evening we just wander around the house, admiring, grinning and fiddling with things. We feel very lucky. Next weekend we are looking forward to our LVGO concert. _Tune in_ next time for more Nozzy News 🎵

<NextPrev prev="work3" next="work5" />
