Disclaimer: I wrote most of this post almost 3 months ago...somehow managed to neglect to hit the publish button....
The patio construction is done! Joel was right, we were in the home stretch.
When I last left off, we were in the gravel compacting stage. Joel took a day off of work last week to work on the patio because he was planning to be out of town all weekend on the motorcyle trip and wanted to get the next phase good and going. He started off the day with this mishap:
Split his overalls lifting the 250 lb compactor out of the truck. He sent me this picture while I was at work. Did he go inside and change his clothes? Nope. Worked ALL DAY in these special air flow optimized drawers. Back off ladies, he's mine, all mine.
We called up Menards and luckily, for a fee that was totally worth paying, they would deliver the pavers to our house. We would have spent that much in gas just driving back and forth across town 4 times to get all the pavers.
Joel inquired about having the pavers set on the side of the house to save us some hauling distance and the delivery fella said that they only deliver to the driveway and then produced the paperwork which backed up his claim.
But then, for $5 cash money, the delivery guy said he could set a couple pallets down on the side of the house for us. Best $5 we spent in this whole project. I hope that fella bought himself a nice cheeseburger for lunch that day! Ha!
We worked and worked and worked and made really good progress that day.
Then it was back to work work instead of home work the next day but when Joel got off, he went right back to laying pavers. He worked and worked and worked and worked until he got all the pavers laid (except the ones that had to be cut). Also, now you can see where Tyler gets the idea that work boots and shorts is an acceptable look.
Then the weekend came and Joel's motorcycle trip got cancelled because the weather was supposed to be crappy all weekend. I encouraged him to take a break from the patio and since it wasn't raining at that time, sent him of on a little local ride for a few hours.
Then when he came home, it was back to work on the yard and patio. We ended up working the whole weekend - with nearly no interruptions from rain. Go figure. At least we made big progress!
We piled up all the left over sand and cleaned off as much of the driveway as possible - this was an important step because our house was full of sand from us walking through it on the driveway and dragging it in on our feet (even with taking our shoes off in the garage, sand was still showing up everywhere). Tyler was a big help with this step.
Then we installed the edging that's supposed to help keep the pavers from shifting around too much over time. And then Joel worked his hind end off on spreading dirt and essentially "landscaping" the grassy area all around the pavers as well as spreading dirt in some of the low spots in our yard. Tyler helped with that too.
Joel put sealer on the pavers and we bought more sand (a different kind this time) to put down in the cracks between pavers and rented that compactor AGAIN to settle that sand. That thing is LOUD.
Tyler got to ride in the back of Joel's truck when he moved it at one point - Tyler thought that was the big time.
And then....last but not least, we ordered our patio furniture! This super cool table with a fire pit in the middle (with a lazy susan cover for when you don't need a fire burning). What does a family do when a fire pit is in the back yard? Uh, have s'mores. Yessiree!!
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The patio construction is done! Joel was right, we were in the home stretch.
When I last left off, we were in the gravel compacting stage. Joel took a day off of work last week to work on the patio because he was planning to be out of town all weekend on the motorcyle trip and wanted to get the next phase good and going. He started off the day with this mishap:
Split his overalls lifting the 250 lb compactor out of the truck. He sent me this picture while I was at work. Did he go inside and change his clothes? Nope. Worked ALL DAY in these special air flow optimized drawers. Back off ladies, he's mine, all mine.
We called up Menards and luckily, for a fee that was totally worth paying, they would deliver the pavers to our house. We would have spent that much in gas just driving back and forth across town 4 times to get all the pavers.
Joel inquired about having the pavers set on the side of the house to save us some hauling distance and the delivery fella said that they only deliver to the driveway and then produced the paperwork which backed up his claim.
But then, for $5 cash money, the delivery guy said he could set a couple pallets down on the side of the house for us. Best $5 we spent in this whole project. I hope that fella bought himself a nice cheeseburger for lunch that day! Ha!
I mentioned that Joel was mostly doing the patio project while I watched from the sidelines (and kept the house in running order, family fed, children bathed, etc etc). Well I did finally participate a little more actively in the project.
First, I laid out the tile pattern in Excel so we could get a good count of how many pavers we'd need. Anal, much? Yes. Thank you for noticing.
And then I took a 1/2 day vacation to join Joel in the sand placing and paver laying part of the project. I was responsible for the sand - Joel did the pavers. Those sons uh guns were heavy. (Also, speaking of guns....check out mine! Ha!)
We worked and worked and worked and made really good progress that day.
Then it was back to work work instead of home work the next day but when Joel got off, he went right back to laying pavers. He worked and worked and worked and worked until he got all the pavers laid (except the ones that had to be cut). Also, now you can see where Tyler gets the idea that work boots and shorts is an acceptable look.
Then the weekend came and Joel's motorcycle trip got cancelled because the weather was supposed to be crappy all weekend. I encouraged him to take a break from the patio and since it wasn't raining at that time, sent him of on a little local ride for a few hours.
Then when he came home, it was back to work on the yard and patio. We ended up working the whole weekend - with nearly no interruptions from rain. Go figure. At least we made big progress!
We piled up all the left over sand and cleaned off as much of the driveway as possible - this was an important step because our house was full of sand from us walking through it on the driveway and dragging it in on our feet (even with taking our shoes off in the garage, sand was still showing up everywhere). Tyler was a big help with this step.
Then we installed the edging that's supposed to help keep the pavers from shifting around too much over time. And then Joel worked his hind end off on spreading dirt and essentially "landscaping" the grassy area all around the pavers as well as spreading dirt in some of the low spots in our yard. Tyler helped with that too.
Joel put sealer on the pavers and we bought more sand (a different kind this time) to put down in the cracks between pavers and rented that compactor AGAIN to settle that sand. That thing is LOUD.
Tyler got to ride in the back of Joel's truck when he moved it at one point - Tyler thought that was the big time.
And then....last but not least, we ordered our patio furniture! This super cool table with a fire pit in the middle (with a lazy susan cover for when you don't need a fire burning). What does a family do when a fire pit is in the back yard? Uh, have s'mores. Yessiree!!
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