Duck-Farm

I have previously mentioned that over my week of vacation I laid about 200 sqft of paving stones in the back yard to expand patio in front of the shed. The adventure started last year when I was having a fit of attitude and started building our shed. One of our neighbours had a similar project where they putting in a small patio. They had bought a cubic meter of this small gravel the size of sand (in fact is like crushed obsidian) to use as a bed for the stones. They only need about 10% of the cubic meter but bought a whole meter because the price was the same. Unbelievably, as they completed their project the had no need of the gravel and asked if we wanted it. So, we got about a cubic meter of this stuff for free. It gets even better. When speaking to lady who gave us the gravel Karen found out that the local construction store was going to change their displays for paving stones and was going to throw most of it away. All we had to do go and pick it up. So, we picked it up about enough stones to do this job in two trips to the store.

Now, the actual construction went something like this. On day one I had peal up a row of 50×50cm stones and remove the 8 inches or so of soft concrete holding them in place. I accomplished this with a standard pick and wheel barrow. I wore out a pair of gloves too. On day two I moved the broken concrete out and dug out some of the dirt to prepare the bed. I also put two 1×2’ retainer boards and somewhat prepared the bed. Again this was low tech with pick, shovel and sweat. On day three Karen helped me to fill the bed with the black obsidian like gravel and place the stones.

On Day four I did the last portion with the washed stone concrete. I think the whole project ended up costing us less than €50. We bought 12 stones at €3.50 each and all the rest was either sweat of stuff we had laying about. You will notice some mistakes. I aware of two (1, the kids ran over it before it was solid and some of the stones moved and I was too lazy to redo it; 2, I left a board in under the blue stones and they are sitting at a jaunty angle now).  Day five was cleanup.

 Some photos:

Work matterials

Preparing the bed of the gravel.

The bed is completed and awaiting stones.

The patern is laid out and awaiting.

About half way through the process.

Staone are in, now I need to secure the far side.

Mortor the last row in on top of some other stones

Noa, the little boss.

Completed from the rear to front.

Completed front to rear.

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Buford