Patio update no. 2

Exactly two months later, it’s time for a patio update.

Here’s where we left off, on the 23rd of August.

Following the digging of the trench, I did lay most of the blocks for the wall on the weekend of Aug. 29 (with some help from my construction adhesive expert):

Then I promptly took a vacation from patio work during the first three weekends in September. Went to Lincoln for a football game. Then Mother Nature stopped cooperating and turned the patio into a swamp for a couple weeks.

During this time of no progress, I had plenty of time to think about ways to complicate the project. The idea of a single, giant 15 x 20 space had been bothering me a bit. The patio needed an additional “something.” So I decided to add a second, lower level to the patio plan. (And remember, the “plan” for this project was never really more than that sketch I showed in the original blog post about the patio.)

So, the last weekend of September was spent adding a few more wall blocks and digging out the space for the lower level, which is just a single step town from the upper part:

October has had plenty of spectacular weather, which allowed for real progress.

I moved the rest of the crushed rock, a wheelbarrow at a time:

Added sand to the lower level:

And started laying the paver stones:

By the end of last weekend, I had moved all of the raw materials from the driveway. All that’s left now are those two palattes full of stone down by the garage:

This weekend: I’ll rake flat the rest of the sand on the patio’s upper level, then start laying the stones. I’m hoping to finish all but the very edge, which is going to need some special cuts to fill in the cracks and small leftover spaces. More pictures on Sunday night.