The new project

Going up to the wire is what it is! Taking about all my time and thinking power at the mo...
We're moving on 3rd July come what may and we have no flooring, windows or working bathrooms yet. The site is a complete mess internally and out (seriously these are the messiest workers going) so it's a mad house getting it all finished off. Windows are the biggest one and should be arriving on the 24th.
No pressure.

 

Finishing is always a pain! It seems to look a mess until the last few days.

 

Yup, but most people don;t wait until the week before moving for the windows... There isn't enough time for it to be finished so works will continue beyond our moving in. If there's any snag at all with the windows then we're completely knackered

 

Starting to think of the move now and called talktalk to move the services over...except they don;t have fibre in the road and would a very slow broadband be OK? Virgin, it turns out, are the only ones to provide any sort of service so have just signed up for them

 

Hello everybody, I’ve been a tad busy of late but figured a quick update might be in order.
Well we have moved in (pics soon), still lots to do and it’s more or less emptied all the accounts so anything needs to be on a shoestring from here on out. one of the things we need to sort is the mud. We need a lawn and a bit of a patio; the patio is already dug out and just needs the levels establishing and the various bit laid, the lawn is needing a bit more thought.

With all the machinery and skips the ground is somewhat compacted. It needs levelling out anyway and topping up with soil so the real question is will I need to bother with rotavating prior to adding topsoil? This is just for the lawn area by the way, other areas such as the front are worse and need at least a light dig over. It’s sandy soil too so I’m thinking it might be ok to forgo the rotavating

rear garden from a few angles




side of house


Side of house facing road that is most compacted

 

New topsoil depth will vary but not less than a couple of inches and in most places much deeper. Seeded as can’t afford turf!

 

Oh, Joy!!!!

The whole place has such huge potential for you, Andy, that's a brilliant choice and decision you've made.

 

The plot is massive (for Surrey) and more or less bare bones on the garden front; maybe I should start a thread for the garden? Lots of rhododendron pont-something (the weed one!) which I'm trying to get my wife to understand will be hacked or removed at some point...

Tried to get the fork into the compacted area yesterday and nearly broke an arm! It is very solid indeed. Perseverance got the tines in though and once the surface pan was broken a bit I could lift and break by going in at the side. It will be an ongoing job but clearly needs doing

 

Have been exceptionally busy recently so only just managed to get back online to say what's been happening.
Well the internal decorating was going OK but had a small break from that as frankly tired of it! The amount of prep on a bare, new build is ridiculous. We also had a torrential downpour where the road and compacted ground conspired against us to funnel all the water under the house - it was gushing under and we've since had to run the dehumidifier to dry out one wall. Needless to say the builder got it in the ear over that but serious damage has been done that can be seen so far.

Out the front I have taken a mattock and dug over the entire frontage to alleviate the compaction; this was left a short while and then topped with 11t of topsoil to level it out a bit and then seeded. All by hand I might add so no need for dieting this year!

To the side I have worked over a few bits of compacted ground but not doing too much as I'll tackle that over winter when creating some veg beds, the rest will have pathways throughout it and any other bits will er... well we'll have to see!

To the rear has been a project in itself. It's on a gentle slope which I wanted levelling out, so digging out from the rear of the garden area and bringing forward to balance it a bit. More topsoil brought in and it is now 'good enough' for the first few years. It will settle and I'll take it from there. Now seeded where I've worked which is probably 2/3 of the final lawn area, the rest has been left for the kids to play and swing; not that they're interested really, they'd rather play in all the spoil left over from digging! It currently looks patchy and a mess but when all grown in it should be OK... The spoil pile I'm just leaving and will probably plant up with flowers for the time being.

All the rocks, hardcore etc left from the house and build have been shifted to the patio and pathway areas. It's a complete safety nightmare area right now with a 3 years and 4 but can't be helped. I'll get some scalpings soon and compact that so at least it will be tidy(ish).

Everywhere I dig there are old bricks. I'm keeping as many as possible so I can create some sort of courtyard area; it might work out, it might not but that's the plan right now.

I've also been trying to sort some summer pruning of some fruit trees but it's going to have to wait I think, just not enough spare time! Over winter I'll move the Bramley and try to make the Braeburn tree upright. There's also a russet apple and a fairly big 'other' which has been very generous this year! We also have a peach tree, damson and something else which escapes me for the minute.