The culprit under attack this week? The "patio," above. it deserves quotes because when we moved in, the patio in the backyard was a 4' x 5' space filled with a hodgepodge of brick, stone, concrete, weeds, and bee-hives. We wanted to have another seating area in the backyard other than the little cafe table on the back porch, so to work we went!
First, we had to dig up the concrete. Literally back breaking- we swallowed more ibuprofen this weekend than either of us have all year Im certain!
Then we extended the patio another 5 feet towards the fence:
Then you have to fill the space with gravel. We used 4 bags:
Then sand. This took 10 bags of sand- 9 for levelling the space, and one for filling in the gaps after the tile was put down.
That took all day Saturday. Reg was at baseball practice for 3 hours, so I give myself a big pat on the back for hauling the bags of gravel and sand and spreading them in the space. When Reg came home we tried to lay the tile, then realized you actually have to use the level on each individual block- all 40 blocks. As always, we are excellent at home improvement the 2nd time we try! So, we pulled up all the blocks and picked up again on Sunday.
Oscar helped out a lot, but is always mad that he has to wear his leash!
It took about 2 hours to get all of the tile blocks into place:
The little hosta in the huge pot will grow to be about 3' x 3' and should cover the A/C unit. The plan is to paint the fence black like we did the back fence, then get some vines to climb up it, and perhaps hang a few ferns from tall plant hooks for some added privacy. Our neighbors to the right are almost never outside, but it would be nice to be a bit more secluded. We are also going to paint the back porch, the concrete foundation, and the storm doors so that there are 1 or 2 paint colors and not the current 4, and so that they aren't robin's egg blue. not attractive at all. Might also stain the visible foundation around the storm doors and the blocks we just put in to make it a bit more uniform. We'll see!
We also planted some tickseed and salvia along the other fence- yellow and purple of varying heights. They should take over that area beautifully and are perennials, so don't have to worry about that side again.
It was really hard work and we are both sore today, but it was actually really fun. We work well as a team, but this was a very challenging project! But at the end of the day, it looks really nice and we were super excited and in love. ;-)
On a completely unrelated note, we went to see a favorite artist of ours, K-OS at the Shadowlounge just down the street in east liberty on Thurs night. What a great concert! The crowd was amazing as well. The place is tiny so he was literally feet away and did not disappoint. The energy was spectacular. It was also cool to see such a diverse group of people, and I dont just mean skin color (though white was definitely the minority, but I think every race represented in Pittsburgh was represented at this show) but also in walks of life- literally all kinds. I also creepily saw my doppleganger- dressed like me, hair like me, it was kinda funny kinda scary. Go Pittsburgh for having such a great venue and bringing in such awesome talent!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtSzpKiARrI
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