So we didn’t go away for a weekend of rest and relaxation (see previous post) – instead we put in 3 days of hard labor on our backyard.
Here is the before picture

As you can see not much going beauty going on . . .

We first removed the deck (well removed in the sense of cutting up the wood and putting it in a pile under the window); then we dug up the deck footing (15 LARGE concreate boulders about 100lb each) during which we broke our shovel – oh darn; That was it for DAY 1

Day 2 started with a trip to home depot to get a shovel; then we dug out the sloped dirt in the back; followed by pondering the actual desgin plan and possible materials (we had an idea of what we wanted, but it has changed since work began – only slightly). We took a trip to Lowes to comparison shop (while there we found the over stair light that I want, but that is a side note) and rested in the afternoon.

Day 3 – another trip to Home Depot for almost 2 hours. We ended up with 3 carts loads including garden bricks, 180lbs of sand and various tools to begin constructing a retaining wall (to stop the sloping dirt in the back). Back home to dig install part of the eventual watering system (which had to go in before the wall went over it); dig a trench for the footing of the wall AND laying the first course of brick (the hardest course to set level etc.)

Scott and I are sore and tired after all our work, but it is starting to pay off