38,000 pounds

30,000 lbs of gravel (shoveled by hand).

38,000 lbs of concrete.

One hard-working husband who looks darn good without his shirt on (thanks to lots of said shoveling and all the other projects he's always working on).

One wife who never again will look at the lack of a patio on a potential house to buy and think "no biggie we can fix that."

Most especially if said patio needs to be built on unlevel ground.

In the city, young yummy mummies want manolos, a fancy stroller, and a designer diaper bag.

Out here, we covet THIS:

Ok, not the concrete truck exactly, but rather a 1000  square foot stamped concrete patio (I had to edit this Jeff has informed me I got the square footage wrong, I thought it was less), complete with walkways and a special hot tub pad. You know, so that the hot tub is flush with the edge of the patio and I can just roll in like a sea lion after a few drinks :-)

After 3 years exactly of living in this house (well 3 years and 1 day, we moved in the day Andie was born) we finally have our patio! It still needs to be stained/sealed or whatever it's called, (that thing you do a month later) but other than that its done. 

Muchos gracias to some of my favorite firefighters, plus one former cop (my step father in law Dale)

They came and helped which was so nice. Jeff can, in my opinion, do just about anything (except high voltage electrical...some nonsense about not wanting to blow himself up...) and can finish concrete, but for a job this size you really need a crew. It was super helpful to have these guys all help out. 

Did I mention what a large pain in the behind it is to build a patio on an unlevel surface?? This required a lot of blocks to build a retaining type wall plus a lot more gravel and concrete than would have otherwise been required. Oh well. We wanted it here for 2 reasons, one it's the sunniest part of the yard for the longest part of the day, and 2, the other potential place to put one was where the septic tank thingies are so that's obviously a no-no. 

After watching Jeff do this a bunch of times, I am starting to learn a little about this process myself. (Enough to know at least that if I tried to finish concrete it would come out looking like dog poo)

Finishing concrete is kind of like frosting a cake...

Isn't it funny how stereotypical male/female jobs correlate? Like concrete finishing/cake frosting (not sure Jeff would agree there...) Quilting/wood working (with all the exact measurements and angles), etc. I could think of more, but I won't bore you. 

After the concrete is poured and starts to "kick," that's when you start the stamping process, which of course is all the rage and desired by all people looking for higher end homes, AKA better for resale and nicer for us to enjoy. So, we wanted to give give it a whirl. (And by we I mean I wanted it and Jeff indulged, he was pretty happy with the final project!)

Here he is throwing around the releasing agent...looks kind of like an Indian ritual. We picked a grayish color base color (you can add dye straight to the truck, who knew?? Not me apparently) and charcoal for the release agent.

It won't be as dark as it is here, this is after the release agent was put on before the stamping. After 2 days we pressure wash it and the charcoal color is mostly in between the stamps (is my understanding anyway). The patio is 3 levels, the bottom one by the walkway shown above is where the hot tub will sit. 

Jeff stamping. Should look like slate when it's done.

View from the back deck inside. You can't see the lower portion here but you get the idea. It's still very dirty and darker with the release agent. After its pressure washed on Friday we can walk on it :-)

Finally after 3 years we are almost done with most of the major landscaping projects. There's still stuff we want to do but most of the bigger projects are done. Can't wait to enjoy it.