Should I say Happy Anniversary??

If I waited about another month, it would be exactly one year since I visited this ole blog. How distracted from it have I been...A lot has happened over the past year..mainly the progression of the house. Flagstone was completed where the deck was and the hole for the pool was finally started. Digging a hole approx. 5 feet deep  proved to be a time consuming, body aching process! We started building a retaining wall out of railway ties to hold back the dirt away from where the pool will be.. Let me backtrack a little bit. The pool is a 20 foot above ground pool which as you know will require level ground to be put up. Well no where on our land is there any place that is even close to level. So major digging was needed to make an area 22 feet round flat. What we have now is an above ground pool that has its north wall level with the ground..so more or less an inground pool but the south wall is on ground...if that makes sense. When it is completely installed, a deck will be built around it..about 4 ft wide made out of plywood and sloping slightly back into the pool. The surface will be painted with that granite rock they have on the market so its not slippery but its slope will hopefully catch splashed water and guide it back into the pool.. Since we are on well water with a very low water supply, the water will need to be trucked in to fill it. The more I can keep, the better off we will be..:)

The construction of the pool area stopped in August to begin the deconstruction finally of this old house! As much as I was looking forward to the process, I actually think now it was the end I was envisioning and not the road it would take to get there.  An absolutely incredible mess everywhere with piles of old lumber, siding, insulation, nails and whatever else we tore off..oh, and windows and doors! Not much was left except for the original timbers inside the walls before we could begin the re-construction. Below are a few pictures of its de-construction and the finished flagstone...:)

Flagstone progress

The weather has not cooperated with us getting much done outside. But we have done what we can and are making progress! At this rate, I will be so happy just to have it all down before the snow flies...here are some images to show where we are..

Top shot shows where we were and where we are as far as the front goes. Stones are almost all in place. Just trying to go thru the pile to find the pieces that will fit into this last area. The deck will be going back up on this very front edge. There is a corner section which will be deck that is about 3 ft wider then the flagstone on both sides so it will be protruding some. Another deck will be built off this little deck that will wrap around the pool we will be putting up next year. The flagstone out front that you see above will be level with the deck. The flagstone that will go around the corner(images below) will have a 4" step up from the deck.

Top photo shows where it was and the bottom one shows today. The lines show the area left to do here. At the top of the photo is an area completed. This comes down 4" off the patio area and is about 4-5' long then will have a 4" step about 14"wide and then another step down to this level. The deck will be at the front end of the drawn line and will step down another 4" to the deck height..if that all makes sense. It has been difficult to come up with the different heights as the back terrace door on the patio is a very different height to the front door. We didnt want to have regular 7" steps incorporated as they would not be as comfortable to walking around on all the time. As well we also had to consider the height of the pool and the deck needed that will go around it to decide the height of the small square deck on the corner. I think all this figuring took most of the time we have spent on this but hopefully we figured it out right..

This is the same area but taken from the patio. Here I have shown where the flagstone will be-toparea closest to us is the area done and then the double lines are the step down and then the lower area that will be 4" higher then the deck drawn in blue

And this is the back patio area. Not much done here accept filling in dirt about 8" and putting up the ledgerock wall. The dirt we have been digging up from down below and bringing it up in the trailer on the tractor so not fun, a lot of work but gotta be done...

To help make this all a little easier to understand, Ive scanned in a drawing that I did of the whole area. It shows the house, where the flagstone areas are,the two decks and the pool & gardens. Hope it all makes sense.. The ink area is going to be the covered roof area that will be over the flagstone...one day...lol