WhyI Like My Desk Job...

The next phase of the landscaping project: remove concrete! Easier said than done.

Here's what the back started out looking like. The entire back yard was concreted in, ie. zero maintenance for the previous owners. Too utilitarian for me! So, what do we do? Jack hammer it out, of course!

Here, Pete demonstrates how boys handle their power tool toys. Good job, Pete! We had lots of help, of course. Lured by the promise of big power tools and beer, 4 loyal friends came to help break up all the concrete over the course of two, looong days. Thanks, guys!

The process went something like this: break apart block of concrete, sledge hammer it in to smaller pieces, if necessary, and carry it to the pile. Sounds pretty straight forward? Logically, yes, it was. Between my 30 seconds of jack hammering (I left the rest to the boys) and sledge hammering, I was left with two HUGE blisters on my thumbs, not to mention so, so, very sore.

I could barely move at the end of the day on Sunday. Pete and I laid on the couch that night completely immobile. Every inch of my body ached! This is why I make a very good desk bunny at work.

This is the pile of broken up concrete we ended up with. What are we going to do with it? Good question! Know anyone that wants any chunks of concrete??

This weekend, we started getting the patio area ready for laying the paving stones. This meant grading the area, both to level the land and slope it away from the house. This involved raking the dirt free of the remaining concrete chunks and pebbles, filling in what used to be the drain hole, pile in two car loads full of substrate sand, and rake it flat. Here's what we ended up with at the end of today.

The next stage is to use a plate compactor, fill the next layer of fine sand then finally lay about 150, 16 square inch HEAVY paving stones. Those get filled in with a sand-concrete mix to finish out the paver project. Putting grass in to the other half of the back yard will come once we figure out what to do with the concrete chunk pile!