Ron's posts with tag: patio
 It's pretty much done. The contractor still has a little more work to do on the patch he made on the porch step that had a piece broken off. I need to hire some painters to match my vinyl siding and paint the little exposed wood trim under the ceiling (and my front door and garage door too).
Here are some additional pictures.
BBQ is August 4. Who's coming? 
 Sand's been distributed to fill in the gaps. I still have a wheelbarrow full of it left. I guess that's about the equivalent of a bag and a half that was swept off afterwards. Maybe I can use it for kitty litter. :-)
The fiberglass stuff is out by the front curb along with some pallets and scrap wood for bulk trash pickup. Yippee! I've already called the city's request line to schedule them to come get it tomorrow morning.
The soffit and fascia are made of Hardie Board - sort of a manmade wood formed like concrete and made to look like wood. It's impervious to termites and corrosion and should last forever. The posts have been attached on top, but still need to be anchored on the bottom.
Looking at the other pictures, you can see that the decking's been installed on top and the tar paper and shingles are sitting on the roof, ready to be nailed down tomorrow.
 We rented a wet saw this morning and cut the pave stones that needed to be cut. The wood edge for the side with the little BBQ pad was removed and pushed back a bit to allow full pavers to be used instead of being cut. That saved some time and energy and gives me a slightly bigger area.
The front part of the roof was removed (compare to yesterday's picture). Hopefully we can get the rest of the ugly fiberglass stuff taken off Monday - there's a Tuesday morning "bulk" trash pickup that can be arranged.
After the area was completely filled with pavers, more sand was swept around to fill the cracks. We'll use some smaller sand (play sand like from a sandbox) to finish filling the cracks. I had a 50 lb. bag and the contractor will buy 5 more.
Somewhere between the contractor and the person at Home Depot, they miscalculated the number of pavestones that were needed, so the extras were returned, and I got a $130 credit to my credit card (I paid for all the materials ahead of time).
No day laborers today, but the contractor brought his 15-year-old son to help out. He's saving money for an Xbox. They'll be taking Sunday off and starting up again on Monday.
There are a couple of additional pictures here too.
 Rain, rain, go away...
There are more pictures here showing what's under cover.
 The holes for the three piers have been dug, filled with concrete, and then covered over. They'll be uncovered later to mount the three support posts after some of the pavers are arranged around them.
The area was filled with crushed concrete (recycled from the same sort of stuff that was broken out), and then mixed with a dry concrete mixture that hardens as it absorbs moisture. Then the whole area was filled with 2" of a special leveling sand.
Today the sand will be leveled, smoothed, and packed. We have a large "compactor" which is a gas-powered machine that's a cross between a steam roller and an industrial vibrator. :-) It was used to compress the mixture under the sand, and will be used again after the pavers are in place.
Over the weekend, some more sand will be poured over the pavers, and the compactor will be used again to vibrate the sand down to fill in all the holes and cracks. Hopefully we'll get the roof ripped out over the weekend too. I thought it was going to be taken out early, but it's been good for keeping the rain off the work area. We're supposed to get even more rain starting around noon today, so I hope they can get the pavers in place before it starts.
More pictures on Flickr.
 I got home too late last night to get a good picture during daylight, so I took a few this morning. Luckily, the rain started yesterday afternoon after they had finished the demolition, and the materials that had been delivered were wrapped in heavy plastic.
There are a few more pictures on my Flickr page.
The contractor and a couple of day laborers are back this morning to level the gravel and dig holes for the piers that will support the new posts. If all goes well, they may even start laying some pavestones today.
 (If you click the magnifying glass above, then right-click the picture and "View Image", you can see it full-size.)
Last night I took the chairs, storage box, mat, and BBQ grill off the back porch, and moved them out onto the grass in the back yard. I took the above "before" picture just as it was starting to rain.
This morning, my general contractor showed up with two day laborers and a rented electric jackhammer. By the time I get home today, the ugly yellow roof and the concrete slab of the porch should be gone and there should be a whole bunch of material delivered from Home Depot and a 20 yard dumpster in my driveway full of concrete.
I'm going to try to take at least one picture each day while they're working. The project should take about a week.
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