Nothin' more American than yard work

This 4th of July weekend has been a pretty uneventful, even boring, when compared to some of the fun things that everyone seems to do. Since it was a long weekend, we felt like we needed to catch up on things that we've neglected or things that take a little more time.

On the 4th, I woke up and started on yardwork. Becca and Riley joined me a little later and we gave 3 hours of TLC to the lawn, shurbs, and trees. With softball season, I hadn't mowed the lawn in 4 weeks (it hasn't rained in quite a while and I don't really water the lawn [it doesn't get too bad], so not much had grown). Riley helped by moving sticks and eating figs off the tree in the back yard (she loves them).

After Riley's nap, we headed to our friends, the Eastley's, for lunch and to swim with them in their pool. My arms are a little sore lifting a giant turtle with Grant on it above my head, spinning, then throwing it. It's my own stupid fault for doing something fun with a 3-year-old because then they insist you do it 68 more times in a row. When will I learn?

After coming home and grilling up some hamburgers, we made cinammon roles. I'll let Becca post the recipes, but they were really, really good (there's vanilla pudding in the dough!). I did help, rolling out the dough, spreading the filling, and cutting the rolls.

For a while, I've wanted to do some work on our "planks". Really, they are walkways that are made from 4" x 3" lumber with planks screwed across them. I tried to find a picture, but they match our deck. Over time the wood has rotted and the step out of one of our back doors was a little shaky. So I wanted to replace the rotted part. Well, with any project, you start it and realize that you have about 3 times more work that you expected.

After pulling up the large step, I realized that there was a lot more rot than I thought and found a small concrete slab underneath. The slab was great, but it left an 8" drop from the door to the slab (with a doggie door used by Bernie and Riley, I didn't think that would be good). Becca and I discussed it and decided to lay pavers instead of replace the wood, since it just sits on the ground and we didn't want the wood sitting next to the house.

Riley helped Becca with demolition. She had a small screwdriver and made sure that all the screw holes were clear. She also pushed around the garden cart (like a 4-wheeled wheelbarrow). After an afternoon of work, here is our new path from one of the back doors to the deck. I'm glad we chose the 8" x 16" blocks instead of the 3" by 6" bricks because I would still be out there laying brick (and it was 1/3 the price of the other choice). In a moment of poor blogging preparation, we didn't get a before picture, but I did add an after-after picture. Don't worry, we aren't ghetto neighbors, we have a bulk pick-up on Monday. There's actually a lot more wood than it seems in the picture.


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So, 1 more project down. I did notice that the downstairs half bath has a drippy faucet. AAHH!