A year in the making.

The work begins the night before

 Ok so maybe not a year but close. We have owned our home for almost 10 years, and we have always talked about extending the porch. Last year we finally decided to break ground. We were so excited. We dug the perimeter and had a huge hole where the porch should be. Then, wind storms struck and blew down our fences on both sides. They were in dire need of replacing. Our porch funds were redirected to the fences. All of our time  was consumed with the fence construction so our porch was on the back burner. Which meant a giant inconvenience when using the back yard.

Hoping it will turn out

 Finally flash forward....we made several calls to have professionals come do this for us.  Either they would not call us back or they said they were too busy to do small jobs like ours. We were told this on several occasions. Very irritating. We wanted it done and with Seths travel schedule we only had certain time frames to do it. A Few weeks before I had been flattening it out, digging out another foot of earth (we decided we wanted it a bit bigger) and trying to figure it out. Seth lined up the equipment and man power and we were ready. Seth and I framed it our the night before and had it mostly complete. Then we hit the ground running the next day.

Laying out the rebar

Ready to be poured.

Thankfully my Brother in Laws were willing to help, THANK YOU! Seth and Dan did the mixing and transport and Luke and I did the actual porch. 8000 Pounds of concrete, a few runs to Chick Fil A and  5 hours of hard labor and it was pretty much done. Not bad considering none of us really knew what we were doing. It actually took us less time than we thought, but it was back and knee breaking.
It is so nice to finally have it done. Now to the rest of the yard that has been neglected for the last 10 years.

Wishing it were done already. Seth, Dan and Luke

Hey it kinda looks like something

Half way there

BOOM! its done!

Luke needed some action shots.

So. so. happy. Couldn't wait to use it.

The next day

The kids wanted to model it.

I had seen some tricks with bricks on pintrest that allow you to mow right up to the edge.  I decided I wanted some color and convenience out there so I have been working on this border all week. We just need to get the tools to put it there so it wont move and it will be done. Still on the agenda is to build a pergola overhead, planter boxes, benches and landscape. I am bound and determined to have this yard fixed up this year!