Adventures in Haglerland: The Patio Project

So, I have really been slacking on keeping up with the blog recently - and it isn't that we have been up to nothing at all, just staying happily busy and enjoying our summer. Sorry, maybe things will get back to normal posting when the kids go back to school next week - certainly something exciting is bound to happen.
Our big summer project was to get the back patio expanded into something more usable... see before:

House before moving into it with 8x12 approx. patio - good for fitting the grill, the smoker, the box of toys, the box of smoker equipment, and stacking chairs - can't sit on it though because with all the stuff we keep on it, there isn't any additional room!!! (Oh and the stupid tree in the middle of the yard - so glad we made them move that!)

The first step in the process, after coming up with the design, and going through all the permitting fun with the HOA and the city - was to measure and stake out the location for digging up the grass...

The larger side of the patio, coming out an additional 4', and going the length of the side of the house up to the master bedroom windows. (This was from April 16)

The smaller side of the patio, adding on a large enough area for the grill and smoker with "work around it all" room.

The next logical step was to dig up all that grass. Enter small children with garden spades...

And when they did a grand total of absolutely no help at all, Blake was recruited to do the heavy lifting, and he recruited his dad for additional help - I tried, really I did, but I was not very good at the removing of grass.

And my parents were recruited to haul away the grass and fill empty spots on their lawn - so everyone was happy - particularly the little boys who just made everyone's loads a little heavier.

After all of the grass was removed, we laid out the stone border in approximate locations where we wanted the rock to end up - and then of course we relocated all of it 3 times before they were actually set. We also ended up having to dig the trench for the stones a little deeper to be able to put a 2" concrete footing down to better secure the edge so that over time our patio would not push the limestone border away from it.

Edge laid out on larger area

Edge laid out on smaller area

Cliff (Blake's Dad) mixing up concrete for the footing

Our lovely footing trench

Concrete poured in the footing trench (This is from May 3)

Guys taking a break from concrete work

After laying the footing, the edging began to take shape - Blake and Cliff mixed up mortar, and got the rocks in!! This process took about 2 weeks, since we were predominately working on the weekends - you know since Blake has a full time job and all - so weekends and evenings were when we got stuff done.

We started with the area directly in front of the existing patio, because we figured that was our "constant", and the rest needed to be aligned to it.

And then of course it started raining when we wanted to be doing work, so that was helpful... but not really.

We did about 90% of the border, and then left one 5' section open so that we would be more easily able to dump the road base for filling in the height of the patio - this made life SO much easier - brilliant plan honey!

A dump truck came and delivered all of the road base - which the boys thought was absolutely the coolest thing that had ever happened at our house.

We laid landscaping sheeting down to prevent (or at least try to prevent) weeds from growing through the patio.

And then we dumped, spread, wet and tamped the road base down - in about 4" deep sections, and then did it again on top.

It really helped to give a feel for how this was all going to come together at the end, and made me very happy.

Large side got done too

After the large side got done with the road base, we added sand, and the boys decided that it was their own personal sand-box - and for a little while, we were the coolest parents in the whole world, and then it rained, and filled up the whole thing, and spilled onto the lawn...

And this is when we realized that our lawn drainage sucks, but not as much as our poor neighbor's does - look at that lake!! This was about 3" of rain in an hour. Great for the grass, awful for our plans to proceed with the patio. (This was the end of May).

The beginning of June saw the delivery of, and our laying out and setting of the patio stone - this took and entire month, no kidding all of June!

Stone delivered to the driveway, where it sat for what felt like a very long time.

The beginnings of laying out the stone the first weekend in June.

The boys playing in their very own 400 s.f. sand box!

Layout of the stone in front of the door (Look at that lush green lawn, too bad all the rain was in May and June, and now it is all brown)

This was the last weekend in June, when we finally had all of the stone laid out just the way that we wanted it to be.

Once all stones were in place, and level, we spread polymeric dust into all the gaps, watered it in and watched it for a little bit (July 4th weekend)