So now what's next?

With all the grass removed and hardscaping added, focus will be on the 3 planting beds next year. This one is closest to the house.



Here's the east side planting bed.



And the west side planting bed.



In the spring, I'll start researching some ideas for what to plant. In addition to planting, here are some more things to review next year to finish the backyard:
- stone ornaments
- wood work, such as benches or trellis
- metal fence and gates at entrance to backyard
- buying a barbeque grill and patio furniture
- painting and repairing the fence



That's it for this year. See you next year!

Last Day

It warmed up again on Saturday, which was much nicer weather than the past few days. The last curbs were added to the perimeter of the patio today and top soil was raked and graded to provide a gentle slope. The curbs are raised about an inch higher around the patio but are flush where the gravel path leads to it.



The original plan called for a 6 foot wide gravel path at the top of the patio, but Jacky advised that the pea gravel wouldn't last long due to the slope. Instead, he recommended using a piece of flagstone as a step down.



Landscape fabric was laid on the remaining path areas and more pea gravel was delivered and distributed as needed. Excess pea gravel was left for me to fill in the low spots in future, which I'm sure will occur over the coming winter.



To stop the pea gravel from bleeding into the grass, brickstop was added.



Jointing sand was swept into the cracks between the patio stones and then lightly watered.



At the west side of the house, soil from curb trenches was used to fill in the ruts caused by the bobcat. The whole area was regraded and the old interlock walkway leading to the garage and house side doors was completely restored with new limestone foundation. In fact, Plus One Landscape, made it better by adding brickstop to prevent future shifting of the walkway.
Although not in the plan, Jacky was nice enough to recommend and have his guys add brickstop to separate the pea gravel and grass areas on both sides of the house. Finally, fresh top soil was raked in and new sodding laid. It looked so much better than before.



Thanks again to Plus One Landscape for all the hardscaping work!

Curbing Day

The weather forecast for today, sunny and cold between zero and six degrees.
This morning I threw on a few extra layers of clothing and dug out and moved the crabapple tree to the new location.



Larger river rock was delivered and spread out around the yard's perimter. Today's efforts concentrated on laying down the curbing on each side of the gravel paths and around the three planting areas.

Patio complete

Another cold morning, I think it was minus one when I went outside at 7 am this morning. We have 2 crabapple trees in the backyard, with one being right in the middle of the gravel path that was planned. The location where the tree was to be replanted was occupied by a skid of curbs, which i decided to move to another spot.
I bashed my index finger during this activity and it started to turn purple and swollen, but managed to finish moving all the curbs and partially dig out the hole where the tree would be replanted before giving up due to the pain.



While the final patio slabs were installed, work began on laying the curbstones and river rocks.

Work continues on the patio

Today, patio tile installation progresses.
I should mention that the primary colour of the Hanson Tuscanni tiles are cappucino (brown) with a 10% mix of sorrento (gray). The guys are doing a great job of randomizing the gray stones. The tiles, by the way, come in 3 sizes - 24x24, 24x16, and 16x16 and are approx 1.5 inches thick.

Here's a pic from the Hanson website which shows the Tuscanni tile with cappucino and sorrento mix of colours.



Front porch flagstone mortaring completed also.

Patio day

Lerwa and James spend most of the day laying the tuscanni stone tiles. They constantly check and recheck that each tile laid is straight and level. I'm impressed with how much time they are spending on this.



When completed, the patio area will be 24 feet wide by 26 feet deep. That's over 600 square feet!

Ah-Gin finishes cutting the flagstone to fit the front porch and proceeds with mortaring them.

Thanksgiving Day - still working

Another cold day in store with high temps of +6C only. The west side yard has big trenches from the bobcat. Jacky tells me to reassure my neighbour that the side yard will be restored at the end of the job.



The rear porch looks great clad in the new flagstone.



Today more limestone is added to the patio foundation, levelled and the process is repeated.



The Hanson valentia steps are moved into place and work begins on laying the hanson tuscanni stone tiles.



In the meantime the front porch flagstone is to be dry laid to ensure the best configuration.

Bobcat day

It's a chilly morning with temperature hovering around freezing.
Today, the the armour rock, flagstone, patio tiles and curbstones from the front of the house to the backyard by bobcat.



The soil was still damp from the past weeks rain and the bobcat got stick a few times a few times but the crew were able to throw more soil under the wheels to give it traction to continue. The old interlock walkway was completely dishevelled and I was started to worry how the foot deep trenches left by the bobcat would be repaired.



Whereever grass was removed, landscape fabric was laid in it's place. To ensure our river rock did not bleed into other neighbouring yards, barriers were installed at the base of the fence using 4 inch high and 20 ft long plastic borders we had bought from Walmart.


The flagstone for the back porch was mortared, while wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow of pea gravel, river rock, and limestone was transferred from the front curb to the backyard.





By end of day, many layers of limestone were alternately added and compressed for the patio base.



With all the hardscape moved to the backyard, the Bobcat had done it's job and was taken away. It's funny how they backed the bobcat into the dumpster and then hoisted the dumpster onto the truck to take it away.

A Busy Day

It's sunny and warm today after yesterday's rain. I'm surprised that they've managed to fill half of the dumpster with sod from Thursday.



Today, gravel and limestone is shovelled onto the area where the patio is to be laid. After lunch, Karen and I headed over to Beaver Valley to select the Armour Rock. After wallowing around in the mudpit and climbing over the small mountain of rock, we tagged the selected pieces with a spot of paint. The guys at Beaver Valley tossed the 100+ pound rocks around like pebbles in their tractor buckets. As Karen's trailer could only take a couple of ton, we brought back ten armour rocks. It took the entire crew to cooerce the rocks into the backyard. I had asked Karen on Thursday if they would be using a bobcat, but she explained that none were available, but she would keep trying.



After the patio foundation was prepared, the front and rear porches were scored. Our plan asked for an additional step at the threshold, so the concrete forms were added.
The various flagstone colours that Karen had chosen were very complimentary to the brick colour of the house as we dry laid them. Before Karen left to pickup the remaining armour rock, we marked out the location of the planter beds, and paths as per the plan.



Surprisingly, a bobcat was delivered later in the afternoon and much of the remaining sod was removed quickly.

Rain Day

Today's Friday and it's raining. No new progress.

Backyard makeover begins today!

I meet Jacky for the first time today. He is co-owner of Plus One Landscape along with Karen. He will be supervising his crew of three who will be with us for the next ten days. While we were chatting Beaver Valley arrived with the hardscape. A quick inventory reveals a skid of flagstone, several pallets of the hanson tuscanni tile, permacon curbing, and hanson valentia steps. Limestone and pea gravel are also delivered later that morning.



Jacky's crew begin the laborious task of removing the sod however with the past 2 weeks of rain, the soil is extremely wet, making it slow going. Jacky advises that they will start at 9 am each day and finish at 7 pm. The forecast is for ran all day Friday, so Jacky will return on Saturday.

Early Surprise

I came home form work today to find landscaping tools and wheelbarrows scattered around the backyard. As Karen had promised earlier in the week, another customer asked that their job be deferred, so our project will start this week instead of at the end of October as originally planned. Works for me!

Design Plan

Here's the preliminary design that Karen prepared for us. She did a great job in addressing all of our wants. However, we hade a budget in mind and sadly, we could not incorporate as much of the plan as we would have liked.



Karen envisioned a low wall where we could sit by the firepit. Around the entire path was flagstone stepping stones. She incorporated a large dining area and another area for a swinging seat. Very nice!

Plus One Landscape

I solicited a number of companies to give us estimates for the backyard work. Most of the other companies gave us ballpark numbers and were unable to provide any design advice. Karen from Plus One Landscape, came out to meet with us several times and even submitted a design plan for our review. Karen gave us some addresses of jobs that they worked on recently and we went to view the work. While visiting one of the past jobs, the homeowner came out to chat about the work that was done. He was most pleased with their detail and professionalism.

StoneLink

I've thought about using Stone-link products for the past year. It's a concrete based product that looks like flagstone. I've visited the head office where they have a display setup in front. Price-wise it's pretty competitive to interlocking and patio slabs.

My brother in law knows someone that installed Stonelink for a front patio. It was installed a couple of years ago. Upon closer inspection, I noticed a lot of chipping and cracking at the edge of each stone tile. I don't know if that was due to defective materials or due to salt. Anyways, after seeing that Stonelink didn't appeal to me anymore. I wanted some material that would continue to look nice for several years.

I took the following picture at StoneLinks head office.

Beaver Valley Stone

Beaver Valley stone has several landscape displays setup using all the different products that they sell. They've got a great assortment of tiles in different materials, sizes, shapes, colours and prices. So many to choose from!
Here's some pics I took at Beaver Valley.

Making a plan

It was hard to imagine getting rid of all the grass in the backyard and then coming up with an interesting plan. With the yard being about 66 feet wide and over 40 feet deep and 8 feet on either side of the house, access should not be a problem.

I know I wanted a patio and some planting beds for later planting of trees, shrubs and perennials. I wasn't sure how big the patio should be but it had to be large enough to have some sitting areas and a dining area. I also wanted to have a corner of the patio for a BBQ.

I tried coming up with a few organic designs but always ended up looking like a mickey mouse head (patio) and 2 ears (planting areas). I started scouring home renovation websites and the web to get professional help.

Before pics

Here's some pics of the yard the way it looked in the summer. The grass was really dry despite my efforts to water regularly. Weeds, quackgrass, and ant hills had overtaken the yard, although the pics probably don't show how bad the yard actually was.

West side yard (looking south):



East side yard (looking north) :



Backyard (looking west) :



looking south

looking north