This half of the patio is a little more challenging. We have the curve of the cement surrounding the steps of the pool to contend with. We are also adding a circular step down and a little extension sitting area outside our bedroom french doors.

The curves are not as bad as I thought they would be. One trick is to make sure the gaps are even all around. It gives the illusion that the stone is actually curved when it isn’t. Another tip is to rent good equipment. We found the wet saw worked as though it was cutting through butter.

So was it worth it to put in a patio ourselves? We saved over $10,000.00. We got a really good workout. We also ended up with exactly what we wanted. Perfect!

When we hear numbers like that we start pricing it out. If we did the work ourselves we could do it for half that price. How hard could it be? We decided to do 1/2 this year and 1/2 next year.

Here is the before:

When the materials arrived I was overwhelmed. I felt sure we had ordered far too much. Oh well, maybe we are doing the whole patio this year.

We recruited the kids to help. Here we are dismantling the old deck. It didn’t take much to knock it down. It was rotting away.

Next came the big dig. We had a dumpster and filled it with earth or whatever that was we dug up.

We spent every evening and a few weekends getting this 1/2 of the patio done. Yes we did use up all the materials in the driveway. That means we need that much again next year.

Oh my gosh I have to do all this again.