Olivers Alma Cottage: The Beginning...

How crazy have the past 24 hours been!

Alma Cottage

After 170 days...we FINALLY got our new house keys...and not without a tad bit of DRAMA!

Settlement was scheduled for 11am, so we had a plan of attack and at 10am, I received a phone call from our conveyancer. I knew that the news was not going to be good...but did not expect to hear her say that the current owners solicitors had lost all their contract paperwork needed for today's settlement!

It was advised that settlement was going to be delayed and we were even talking a day or two! However, {thankfully} the owners were leaving for Vietnam on Sunday and were not coming back till Christmas...so that meant settlement was now deemed 'urgent'.

Within an hour, we were told the contract was found but was still not in Melbourne for settlement, so the time was pushed back till 3pm.

After getting the keys at 3:30pm, I was finally on my way to our new house!!

After arriving and figuring out which key opens the front door, I realise we have no electricity. This would not normally be a big problem, however, we only have electricity to the property...no gas or mains water...so no hot water, no heating, no lights. After speaking to our electricity company for an hour, we were finally told a technician would be out before midnight to connect our meter!

So lighting a fire and pulling up tiles by a gas light, we were finally working on the floors! At 8pm...we got our electricity!

Living Room{BEFORE}...with the aqua tiles and aqua paint!

Ripping up the aqua tiles to reveal the Vic Ash floorboards!

James had almost finished pulling up the floors when we hit a board that just crumbled...not good. We found a few boards with termite damage so the decision was made to replace those boards in the morning. {My husband however had never installed floor boards before but after assuring me he knew what he was doing because he had watched YouTube video's I was convinced...lol!}

Termite Damage..

The older girls pulled up a few rows of nails from the boards and fell asleep in a heap in front of the fire on the 4x4 Mattresses, snuggled in their sleeping bags. Very excited!