Well it’s more like grass shooting up through vintage bricks and I was sick of trying to tend to it.
And this was on a winter day…So Fast forward to summer.
When I weedwacked the hell out of it the bricks looked okay. But after a week of growth it would look like hell.
So I pulled the disaster up… and it’s almost always I underestimate the work that will need to go into a project. Don’t get me wrong I realize the process. I am the queen of research… but much like a tiny dog I have no concept of being anything else but MIGHTY! And the actual work in between the phases of progress is almost non-existent until I actually get there. This trait has gotten me through hellish tasks. I call it “informed ignorance bliss”. I digress… I started the task of pulling up the bricks. It was fairly easy since most were literally embedded in dirt. No gravel or sand… just dirt. I noticed that a lot of bricks were terribly eroded. So I continued to stack my salvage and made a mental note I needed to find more vintage bricks.
I also started tamping and leveling the dirt. But in the end I needed to remove about 2 inches of it.
After I pulled up the center I realized one of the side walls was so crooked I would need to pull that up too. Which was not part of the plan. I made a string line to level the bricks.
It took some time but it looked much nicer. I had to pull up the bricks. Lay the paver base to the correct height, tamp it down and then relay the bricks. I used a rubber mallet and a level to level the bricks. My string line kept the row straight.
Before I could start on the herringbone pattern I had to get the paver base and slag stone down. My little trailer barely made it. The weight of the two tons of crush concrete nearly pancaked my trailer tires. I had to haul my haul to the nearest tire shop to inflate my wheels to the air pressure it should have been. Note to self check that shit before you put 2 tons in it.Once I got it to the house the hard work was had only begun. I HAD TO HAND SHOVEL all of it out on to a tarp.
Needless to say it took some hours. I started flesh in the morning shoveling the paver base into place and tamping it down.
I only gotta the first few rows down and the neighbors were already commenting on the vast impovement.
But rewind to when I took that mental note on needing to find more vintage bricks to replace the eroded ones.
I found some bricks on Offerup for free. But I had to get them myself and you know my mighty syndrome. Even my horoscope told me “know your limits”. I stopped at 4 wheel barrels full and declined the rest. It was work to get them loaded up and unloaded.
It was a job baby! I had to take a rest for the day.
The next day I was back to the grind and any day after that when it wasn’t raining.
The final steps were to add the sand and use the compactor to settle it in.
