DIY Paver Patio

Our project this year was to create a new flowerbed, a paver patio, a retaining wall and a fire pit.  Man was it alot of work!!  We started out by visiting our local nursery to find out what kind of stone we wanted.  My husband had a design in mind and we just need to get our heads around what we needed in terms of material and labor.

We ended up getting a kit for a paver circle and a fire pit and then measured how much more square feet of pavers would need.  We watched alot of you tube and asked alot of questions to the professionals.

We decided to use a couple different kinds of paver.  We used Belgard pavers in a couple of different variations....Cambridge Cobble, Holland Stone and the Stonegate retaining wall stones. We were able to get our pavers from Amcor, but if you are not a contractor, you must go to your local distributor to get them.

We took out the grass, compacted the dirt...leveled it and compacted it some more.  We brought in about 12 ton of 3/4 in road base and leveled that...compacted it again, added some sand and then finally laid the pavers and the retaining wall stone.  Once that was done we back filled the space behind the retaining wall, compacted the patio again, cleaned off all of the existing debris...added some polymeric sand.  Make sure you clean off the excess sand and then wet it down.  We let it dry for 24 hrs.  Once that was done we added our fire pit  and then we added a sealant to make the stone look wet and shiny rather than all dried out.  We added weed fabric and plants in the flower beds and put down bark and had curbing put in to tie it all together.

It took us about us about 6 weeks to finish it all!  There were a few missteps and things we didn't expect like a honey bees swarming on a tree we had to pass under while bring all of the road base and sand down, adding retaining wall pieces to help keep the patio level, and even flipping over the sod cutter machine!  But...in the end, it was definitely worth the time it took to build!

Watch the video to see the transformation!!

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Heather

We're finishing our Basement!

The process of buying a house is LONG and frustrating.  We originally put an offer on another house, but when that deal fell through because the square footage was smaller than was originally disclosed, we were left looking for another home.  Our wedding was only 3 months away and we were getting a little stressed about having a neutral spot for everyone to start our new journey together.  We kept looking...and looking...and looking it seemed.  When we found this house, I was drawn to it.  I knew it only had 4 bedrooms which would mean we would have to either share or finish the basement.  I remember looking at it for the first time and something about it just felt like home.  The previous owners had put some work into the main and upper levels, they had reinforced the cement floor in the garage that is over the bonus room, and they had put in a deck and did some landscaping out front.  It seemed so inviting to me.  We looked at it a few times and had some inspections done on it.  I knew this was the house for us...and fortunately so did Rex!  When we put the offer in it already felt like it was ours.  The kids all liked it and were excited about what it could be for us all too!


Our basement was never, ever finished since the time it was built in 1979.  Having 4 kids and only having 4 bedrooms upstairs meant that someone had to share...2 somebodies in fact!  Thank you to Lucy and Cecelia for taking one for our team! 


So yep...we are finishing our basement! .....AND  it's almost done now!!  We are so close after a year of working on it, its almost finished!  We decided to use a contractor and there have been good and bad with that.  Some things have been smooth and some have been extremely frustrating...but that's all part of remodeling right!  If there is ever a next time for this, Rex and I would just use subcontractors to do specific jobs!  We have learned a lot through this process, which is the goal right!!


I know it was challenging to have such close quarters for awhile, but now...everyone gets their own room!  And we get an extra bathroom and a bonus room!!  Not to mention the washer and dryer moved downstairs and we have a mud room for our shoes and things!  Rex was able to put in our laminate floors on his own and now we are just having the last part of the carpet laid.  Soon the kids can all have their own spaces! 


Its been a long time coming, but it was so worth the wait!  I'm excited to have our house complete!


Here's a short video of some of the pictures I took during the process!

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Heather