Rendering

A short video of the render going on:-

Tap the triangle to play the video. Then tap the open square in the bottom right of the video to watch full screen.

The render is then roughly flattened then scratch like so:-

Brick laying

I have never laid a brick in my life. How hard can it be?
This is approximately what I want to end up with:

First course:-

Second and third course

The best part of a 30kg bag of mortar to lay 27 bricks. At the moment I am not sure if those loose bricks on the top will be the finish or I will find some suitable coping stones.

Tiling Complete

After an unusually dry October the tiling is finally done!

One slight problem. A puddle.

 

  

 Even after 18 hours

More Steps

The steps from drive to garden have now been cast.

The top step is now above the level of the grass  so I have some landscaping to do.

 

 The steps between the two terraces now done. Area on the right is for a water butt.

Centre and corner step

A small foundation was also laid to support a planter which will hold a flowing climber of some sort to grow up an over an arbour which I will construct in due course.

 

Rough plan of the arbour/windbreak. Two standard fence panels will be set at the back of each 1.8m bay. Hope fully flowering climber will grow up and over before too long. A rose of some sort will give us most blooms for longer than a glycine.

Steps

New steps from the drive to the garden have been cast

 And a new step on the side

New step on the front

Three steps still to be made here with a platform to the right to support a water butt

Cheery Tree, before and after pruning

11th April 2017

 22nd April 2018

Walls Capped

Not sure yet if we we reuse the old fencing

Concrete all 13m3 of it

Concrete lorries were due in the afternoon so while the builders were waiting they built the new retaining wall.

  

A bit of a squeeze to get the pump lorry down the drive.

  

The pump lorry was soon joined by the second.

 

 The second lorry feed the pump.

 

And the concrete pumped onto the first terrace, 8m3.

 

 When second lorry was empty the pump lorry dropped another 5m3 on the second terrace. They were about 4 wheelbarrow loads short which was soon mixed up and thrown on by hand

 Both terraces were smoothed out with the required 5cm slope over 5m.

The lorry drivers spent as much time cleaning the lorries as they did pumping the concrete

Now we wait for it to harden enough for the block wall to be built on the edge of the terrace.

We have to make a decision now on how high to make that terrace wall. Initial thoughts were to be the same height as the retaining wall on the left then capped. With a wire balustrade behind to prevent kids or idiots falling off the terrace.

Shuttering

Both terraces now prepared for the concrete pour which should happen tomorrow. I hope to be here to see it. In order to achieve a 5cm slope (1cm per meter from the house to the garden and to have sufficient depth of concrete at the garden edge the new concrete will be at a level about quarter of the way up the existing steps and the tiles will therefore be half way up. Not ideal but the alternative is to take up the whole concrete base.

Cement surface layer removal

For the cost of a few beers they have taken all the old tiles away too.