Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Our New Patio

Kelly and I have lived in our house 5 years this July!! Over the past few years we have slowly made a few changes. Finally we decided it was time to re-do our back yard. It was horrible!!!

Our backyard is very, very tiny. There was a cement slab and large rocks put in before we bought the house. Over the years weeds started growing in between the rocks and it was just a disaster. We had several people come out for estimates and suggestions. We thought about getting a deck put in then we had another thought to pour concrete over the existing slab and rocks to make it even and bigger. I really wanted a cover or arbor put in but because of how our backyard is set up we couldn’t because of Home Owners Association regulations…It has been a long process but I am glad to say it is over! We love our new patio so much. I took lots of pictures of the whole process.

I’m a little scared to put the before pictures because of how bad it was. Keep in mind that we knew we were getting a new patio so we had really let it go!

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I know bad, uhh? I hated going outside and looking at this awful mess. Totally useless, wasted space. Gracie was constantly tripping over the rocks and it was just a BIG MESS, that’s all I can say!

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We first had to remove all the furniture. There was only one place to put it! (Leslie, notice my trash can you painted for me back in college? Still got it!)

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The last day of school the big project was set to start! Workers got here that day around 10 am and stayed until nearly 6:00 working. They dug up rocks, framed our new patio, and poured the concrete and salt cured the cement. I took pictures from inside our house.

Gracie was very confused at who was outside our back door and what they were doing to make us not be able to go out and play. This is what she did most of the time!

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It took over 24 hours for the cement to dry and finally we could go outside again!!

15 days later…. they came to stain the cement. So once again we had to move everything in the yard. We chose a brown stain and when it was finished it looked like this.

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It had to dry for 24 hours then they came back the next day to seal it. We had to wait another 24 hours for it to dry

We have been waiting a long time for this…. finally we have the after pics! (Drum roll………)

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We have SO much more room now! Kelly moved the grill so it’s out of the way. He has is own little grilling station in the back. Now we have so much room for the table and chairs plus her water table AND there is still room to walk around!!! We still have some more work to do to clean it up and make it nice but so far we love it!

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We have one happy little girl now!!!

And that’s all that matters, right????

2 comments:

Leslie said...

Looks great! Maybe look into one of those retractable sun shades or something. It's too hot in this heat!! Love that the trashcan is still around :)

The Gleasons said...

Yay!! Good for you guys! It looks great! We just had a new patio put in, too. :) Our girls were tripping on rocks, as well. ha!ha!