Backyard Makeover, Phase 1-Yard Clean-up and Fence Part 1

This is going to be a long post, because this is the biggest project we've ever taken on and Matt insists that I include a lot of pictures!

Over Matt's workation we he took on the long awaited fence project! We've been saving up and waiting to do the fence, since we moved in. Matt has researched and prepared everything pretty much perfectly. He's awesome. He almost finished it over his vacation week, but we went on a little get-away for a night, so we didn't quite get it done. He's finishing it up right now, like I'm blogging while he's working, so the final fence pictures will be coming soon.

Here are a few before pictures:

From last spring, before we bought the house.

From a warm day in February. It's hard to tell but there is a lot of overgrowth and just random tree stumps and stuff all over the place.

Branches, over growth and roots were everywhere back there. It was just a mess.

You get a better idea of the overgrowth from this picture, from last year.

There was also a few panels of a very old, leaning fence and a few lone fence posts (piled up right there) that we ripped out.

Here are some pictures after the clean-up phase.

Can't you tell how bad we needed a privacy fence?! Especially with that road behind our house.

 

Matt then ordered ALL of our fencing supplies through Lowe's and they delivered everything straight into our garage. It was AWESOME!

It was quite the production. They showed up in this big truck with a fork lift and all.

Doug arrived (thank goodness!), they rented a two-man auger and nearly killed themselves (not really, but it was killing us just watching them!) drilling the holes. A few inches down the soil here is hard clay and is so heavy. The auger was so heavy. Doug put a rope on the bars and around his neck for support and he had rope burns on his neck!

The day (their backs and a lot of time) was saved when our good friends Jason and Daniel showed up to help. Seriously, we would have been digging holes for days if they hadn't shown up.

They went so much faster. They dug about 23 holes-I think. The city requires them to be 30 inches deep and that is so deep! My entire leg could have fit down these holes. These guys were amazing!

All of the supplies.

They thoroughly enjoyed their day of rest on Sunday. Doug and Katie stayed until Tuesday, so they worked hard on Monday. And it rained all day long. Luckily it was warm though. They got all but 8 posts up and cemented that day.

I mean look at those puddles! Our poor backyard was a swamp! Much of the grass was ruined since they had to do most of it in the rain.

But it got better. Tuesday was warm and sunny all day. I was so thankful, since we had the boys outside with us most of the day. The post holes were completely full of rain, so we built a little contraption and drained those and then Matt and I finished the 8 remaining posts, worked on cutting the rails and other things.

We were suppose to get "severe storms" for Wed and Thurs so we decided to pack up and take a little trip to Pittsburgh for the night. And from what we hear it didn't rain much while we were gone, but it was a fun and needed break.

Daniel came back over and helped Matt mount the rails.

Then Matt finally got to the easy part and also finally got to use his Christmas present that he has been dying to use-his air compressor and nail gun. He posted all of the slats (I don't know the technical names).

And it rained most of that day too. But this time it was cold rain. It was a weird week as far as the weather went!

And then it really started looking awesome!!!

Matt got to this point and decided to end for the week, which he is finishing now (hooray!).

Isn't she a beauty?

We'll post the completed fence pictures hopefully this weekend! 

And if your curious what the rest of the "make over" involves...well, you'll just have to wait and see!

Happy Spring!

finally