zihui

No la soonliew, it's still too early to say Let's wait before the the entire renovation is complete to comment

PRECISELY! It's madness what the restaurants charge. Where's the justification behind their pricing? that's an idea... i'm not much of a drinker but the man of the house is perpetually thirsty. He just ordered his wine chiller today. Which wine supplier would you recommend / do you use?

I agree with vanessa - everything's coming together really nicely!

Why not? I think Tomyam seafood soup is the best thing to have, particularly on a rainy and gloomy evening. I would be very interested! But I was surprised at how cheap mussels are! The HTB bought mussels from Cold Storage to steam them in white wine and garlic sauce and because they were so cheap, he ended up buying way too many. The wine cost so much more than the mussels - but then again, the wine brought us more joy than the mussels did so I guess that's fair pricing....

LOL all we need now is for Vanessa to come up with her own cookbook - 'Budget Recipes for when you've spent too much on renovation', then we can get her to sign it for us! LOL

hahahaahaha within 12 days, i've hit 15% already. outstanding! teehee but to be fair to JT, it's not his fault. It's entirely mine (and a little bit caused by the previous owner 'A') because ever since the reno process has started, I've been asking for additional things in the house. Here's hoping everything works out and comes together nicely.... *fingers tightly crossed*

hahahahaha OMG i know none of them except Matt Preston and the only reason why I've heard of him is because of MasterChef oh he LOVES Marco Pierre White and Anthony Bourdain. I think the HTB particularly likes the hard smoking, hard living bad boy chefs

It really is Mission Impossible. Like i was telling Sarah, the budget has already been increased by $6K thus far and we've only on Day 12 of renovations...

Before I forget - over the past weekend, we also received the first mock up of the wall decal that the HTB wants to place in the kitchen. We've demarcated a 6 ft by 6 ft wall space in the kitchen for the wall decal to go up. As a huge reality cooking show geek, this is something that he really wants. Oh well. Anyway, here's the first mock up of the wall decal - Any comments? Or any other chefs that we should consider putting up there? I'm voting for 'Vanessa Frida' to be added in I'm personally thinking that there's too much 'dead space' but on the other hand, I'm also worried that if the space is too little, then that creates a very messy feel to the wall decal.... Any thoughts?

not picky - you have discerning tastes! and when it comes to affairs of the kitchen, who better to turn to for advice than Singapore's version of Nigella Lawson? teehee maybe 'installation' is the wrong phrase to use - more like the delivery of the modem, the router and the setting up of the internet network. we're putting off the cable tv until the last week of October. it's a guy thing but the HTB won't be around next week to oversee the process - he's heading to Phnom Penh for the week. IMPOSSIBLE! hahahaha we havn't even started on the tiling yet, although that's slated to commence today / tomorrow.

OpenNet updates: The OpenNet termination box is up on the 2nd floor! The OpenNet guys doing their checks: So after the OpenNet installation is done, the Starhub technicians will be coming down next week to do THEIR installation.

3m of wiring... works out to be around $33 extra right? i would rather use that money to get some kitchen stuff from the TB shop that you used. On a sidenote - i'm LOVING the Jamie Oliver chopping board! Absolutely droolworthy. Am going to add more items to my 2nd order this weekend. *evil grin*

My vote goes for distressed black to fit in with the pipe shelves!

How fun - yet another (minor) hiccup. Just received a call from JT. The OpenNet cable installation guys are at my place right now to lay the required cables, optical fibre (coupled with surface trunking) and to set up the Termination Point. When the FSM conducted the house audit at my place previously, he was very firm that the Wifi Router has to be set up at a particular corner on the 2nd floor in our Reading Room. Because of that, the OpenNet guys will now have to extend cables up to the 2nd floor and according to them, the 'free' installation arranged by Starhub only applies to the first 15 metres or something like that. Since the router will be on the 2nd floor, they'll now need to extend the cables upstairs and will probably do the Termination Point there as well - all at a separate charge, to be charged on per 5 metre blocks. So now he's going to keep one eye on the OpenNet trunking and the other eye on the tilers. How fun - more unexpected costs! Update: JT IS THE MAN! Basically he's discussed with the OpenNet guys and has managed to settle this for us! We're going to go down to the unit to check on the progress tonight and we're going to treat him to dinner for the help! *huge beam*

HAHAHAHAHA He better not... Our new WCs, hood, hob, oven and some minor misc items have been delivered just today. We can't afford to buy more stuff to replace the ones that he steals. Oh wait... I'm pretty sure he can afford his own (nicer) furniture and not covet ours.

I absolutely agree with you, vanessa! There are so many different stages.... The tiles should be in place *hopefully* by early next week and that'll make the place look totally different too! You're now at the finishing stretch and the most exciting stage - the installation of the carpentry!

JT's Daily Update (30th Sept '13) More work on the windows today. And the window grills are finally up! So we have officially gone from these windows and grills: (sorry, I don't have an individual shot of the windows and grills. This is a photo of the dining area and you can take a quick peek at the old windows & grills to the right of the photo) To the new ones! A better look at the new windows and grills:

Congrats on starting your new t-blog, neighbour!! Looking forward to watching the transformation taking place!

That's good advice, vanessa we'll have to factor in these unfortunate hiccups because i'm pretty sure this may be the first hiccup, but it's not going to be the last

Cheers makan! btw totally loving the photos of you conducting training and cuddling the dog

hahahaha you're right best to start them off at a young age - wonderful training! (plus the more independent they are, the less we'll need to do or worry about teehee) i absolutely agree with you... these hiccups are uncalled for and are items that we cannot possibly budget for =(

Alternatively, you can wait until the 3 princesses to grow up and THEN force their boyfriends to do the housework IN ADDITION to changing the lights Yup, that's a good 'glass half full' way of looking at it. Anyway according to JT's daily updates, the pipes have been cleared (at a cost, of course) so that's the first hiccup settled.

JT's Daily Update (27th Sept '13) Waterproofing going on today as per scheduled: According to JT, the chokage in the balcony and toilet drainage pipes are cleared at last after the workers spent a couple of hours on them. I guess this brings new meaning to the idiom, "Throwing money down the drain"

LOL especially if you light up a cigarette or candles then vanessa's 'KABOOM' picture will happen

hahahaha yeah i did - but i didn't know about the decayed bird trapped inside the wooden board! POOR BIRD!!! haahahahhaahh gross to the max. that's true... on our property hunt, we did numbers (2), (4) [with the permission of the owners] and (5) For (5), it came at the suggestion of another RTer, so we called up the town council & HDB. There's a upgrading program in place, but no time schedule given. So heck care, we're going ahead with our desired renovations and will be opting out of the upgrading program.