Last week saw a new roof put onto the shed, the flooring almost completed, the lounge painting completed, the kitchen almost completed, and some other small jobs finished, or on the way to being finished.

Don’t let anyone tell you laying laminate flooring is easy – it most definitely isn’t. Poor Tom and Paul would put anyone straight that would suggest it’s easy. It took them three solid, hard days, most of which was spent on their knees. They finished around 3.30pm on Friday, but at 2pm I seriously wondered if they weren’t going to curl over. They looked absolutely done in. It’s almost finished now, with just a small amount of edging quad to go in on Monday morning.

Whilst the guys were laying the kitchen floor, I finished off painting what I could in the lounge. After Tom went home each day, Paul would finish painting the bits in the lounge I couldn’t reach, behind the fire place and most of the ceiling.

Last night with the painting virtually finished, and the floor almost completed, we moved the lounge suite, rug and TV unit back into the room, and we hung the curtains. What a pleasure it was to be able to sit in front of TV in a nice room, with curtains shutting out the world for an hour or two last night. None of it’s a perfect job. How could it be in a far from perfectly built house. But wow, what an improvement. We’re very, very happy with it.

Today Paul had made several tip runs to get rid of a weeks accumulation of rubbish. On the last one he brought back a trailer load of pine chip mulch. It’s not a mulch I particularly like, but it’s very successful at retarding weeds and lasts well. My sister, Wendy, came across from Lonnie for the day and helped me to cut old carpet into strips which we’ve laid around the edges of garden beds and then piled the pine bark mulch on top. Hopefully it’ll keep the gardens easy care and weed free for tenants. Then they’ll only have the lawn to content with, and hopefully when we can come back to the house, the hard work we’ve so far put into the garden won’t have been completely negated.

The kitchen is almost finished. Still to do is the tiling, a bit of painting around the windows and door and hang the blind. We have valances that match the lounge curtains but I don’t thing we’re going to get a chance to get them up. It won’t matter. Hopefully Paul will get those small jobs finish tomorrow.

Next week the guys will complete the shed ready to store our belongings at the end of the week. We have the real estate agent coming on Tuesday to photograph the house for finding a tenant. By Saturday it all has to finished, everything has to be in the caravan ready for when we can come back. All our other belongings have to be packed in the shed. Our caravan and ute have to be in storage and our bags have to be packed for the UK. Next Saturday and Sunday we’re staying with my sister in Lonnie before leaving for Melbourne on the Monday.

It’s been a hard, hard slog, but we’re on the home stretch now. Well, that’s the home stretch on this side of the world. We haven’t had time to think about what awaits us on the other side of the world yet. We just haven’t been able to let ourselves think further ahead than taking each day as it comes here, head down, bum up, and nose to the grindstone.