The beginning is the most important part of the work.

They say, (more truthfully Lao Tzu said) that a journey of one thousand miles must begin with a single step. Well today I have taken our first big decision on the external finish of our house and have resolved to use "Timbercrete" for our walls.

Timbercrete at night

You can read more on Timbercrete here. But to give you a quick low down, it is a manufactured "masonry block" that consists of Cellulose (radiata pine - saw dust) sand, cement and 11 secret herbs and spices, that make the product fire resistant, water resistant, very tough (think dents like wood, not cracks like brick) it's able to achieve a thermal "R" rating value many times higher than a clay brick. Also we think it looks the ducks guts! (that's a good thing)

Being my first post I guess that I'm getting a little ahead of myself, for those of you reading whom do not know me personally, let me catch you up a little.
We (my wife Liza and I) have decided to build our own home. It is our first "home" and as such we thought we may as well shoot for the stars.

We have many goals for this building and the most important is the "feel like home" factor. I'm not too sure what that means either?  But it's easy to explain what we don't want.
We do not want a McMansion! these fine examples of our great Australian dream are at the other end of the scale, although our home will undoubtedly share many common features, like walls, floors and roofs, that is about a far as we want to go.

One of the goals of this Blog is to share our experience with others, so they may keep abreast of what we doing in our lives (regarding the building), and to help others thinking of going down the same path, be it with material choices, finishes, design matters, red tape or otherwise. If you have any comments please level them after each post or email me and I'll include a response where i can or perhaps post an answer if it is warranted.

"On Our Selection"
1 acre.
Hill top in North Cowra NSW.
Granite Outcrop - strewn with small and large boulders.
Sloping red sandy clay
Westerly Views (filtered) through 200 degrees and many established trees, native and otherwise.

just a few of the small ones

View to the north from where the shed will be

the flat back yard

Tens years strong. Planted in drought and survived 8 years of drought conditions
- Hardy much?

Our preferred building location

Ariel view showing neighbours. our block is bound but the arc of pines
on the left and the row of tiny conifers on the right.

Westerly view over river flats toward Conimbla National Park

On our selection - a classic Australian film - for your entertainment! (10mins long - there are 7 other parts :)