I did a quick about face and prioritized putting together my (mini) patio project. I’d had something like this in mind for a while but had to make some quick executive decisions about size and proportion. Putting it together was actually a whole lot of fun and resulted in only about a week of extreme back strain on my part after the main day of slinging 100lb 2×2 pavers around. The first step was figuring out exactly how big I was planning to make it. I put my trusty (and much abused) painting drop cloths to use in visualizing several options for size.
There was an odd and somewhat useless little sidewalk running along the back of the house to the back garage door. I decided to cover and incorporate it into the patio area. Using a fun labor-saving product from the Depot du Home, I skipped digging in 8″ of gravel and replaced its function with Brock PaverBase panels. These 1/2″ thick rigid foam panels distribute the load and separate the patio from frost heave the same way the deep gravel base does.
Dad mattocked up the edge of the area, I dug out all the sod and we leveled and tamped the soil to 1″ less than our goal height sloping away from the house at the recommended 1/4″ to the foot.
Then we laid landscape cloth and started pouring out and leveling sand the same way.
Laying the pavers was a little onerous but Dad and I teamed up to get them in place with no back strain (him) and about a week of being super stiff and sore (me). Laying them in place and seeing it come together was totally worth it though.
Here’s a marble I found while we were digging it out. I imagine that this was one of Elizabeth’s toys from the early 60’s lost all these years. Isn’t it so pretty!
The final patio will look different when the back of the house and the house-garage connection are complete so I’ll save the final shots for later. For now I’ll just fixate on the pretty striated grey concrete:
