Pre-Planning is passed, and garden plans continue!

Wahoo! We have pre-planning, which I'm now hoping means that actual planning is going to be passed without any issues.

Looking ahead, we have a plan of attack for the build, and we are extremely lucky that my dad has offered his help over summer (He lives in Florida, but had his own building business in the UK, and has been working on big builds in the US for the last couple of years.) so he'll be coming to stay with us for 10 weeks!! I'm so excited, as this not only means that Steve will have someone helping him to move things along faster, but we get to spend some quality time with him too. Him and Steve get on like a house on fire. I can already see the BBQ and beer fridge are going to be working overtime this summer ;-)

Which leads me nicely onto the garden...We have recently put in a concrete base for the new workshop (which should be delivered in the next week or so). This shed is going to be the new garage essentially, as the current garage will be demolished to make way for the new one going up. Once the shed can be emptied into the new garage, we were planning on turning it into a summerhouse. However...being a man of many tools, and general hoarder of stuff...we have decided to keep it as a workshop, and to get me a summerhouse too! Yippee

We have been very fortune to find a beautiful, 2nd hand one by a company called Chelsea Summerhouses , they make stunning handmade summerhouses, and I'm so excited! We had some lovely stone delivered on Monday, for a patio in front of the summerhouse, and the greenhouses and existing shed will be moved in order to make way for it all. I've created a mood-board...sad, I know! Here is a link to my "House Build" Pinterest board

...And suddenly it's all go!

We have submitted our pre-planning, and we have had a lovely lady round from the local council who liked our plans. We are waiting for these to be signed off, then we can submit full planning - this should take around eight weeks. We have had to go down the development route as not much of the existing building will remain - so it's not a straightforward extension.

Since we are waiting around for things to progress, we have had a lovely local company in to erect a new fence along the side which joins us to the school. Luckily the school have been brilliant about this, and allowed the tractor into the playground over the weekend to put the new posts in.

The girls weren't interested in the big tractor in our front garden - I was definatley the most excited.

A picture from the school's side, once all the old fence had been removed.

We are so pleased with how it looks!

Next we are ordering a new shed to use as a garage, as the first part of our plan is to demolish the existing garage - and Steve has so much stuff in the garage it is unreal! So all of that will need a home, plus tools and bits for the build, so he has to have a 16ft x 10ft one....of course! So we dug out for the base of that at the weekend. I say we, more like he did it, I supplied drinks, and was his wheelbarrow-bitch for the day. We both ached for a few days after, but it was worth it as things are progressing now.

We have also ordered some lovely Indian stone for a new patio in the top corner of the garden, which means we'll need to get rid of the greenhouse behind the shed soon. Hoping to clear everything out of the garden eventually, but for now the old shed will remain, as it is full of garden stuff, and won't fit anywhere else. Plus it is the same age as the house, so will fall to bits if we try and move it!

I'm hoping to post more regularly now that things are moving. It is so exciting now that things are becoming a reality...Roll on getting planning, and getting the diggers in!