Let Construction Begin - Day1

The Easter weekend dawned, the timber was piled high - I'd taken the oportunity to purchase a Compound Mitre Saw & I had thousands of Decking screws - it was time.....

The Beginning...

with a look the other way.

First step was to clear the turf (read: 'some grasss + lot's of weeds in a heavy clay soil) from half of the garden. By day I'm normaly deskbound - I'd thought I was reasonably fit but after several hours of digging I was seriously wondering if the garden wasn't actually that bad and maybe I could live with it after all? It also crossed my mind that here was a new fitness opportunity, if you can have Cross Fit & Military Fitness Class's amongst many others why not 'Dig Fit' - all you'd need would be a muddy patch of land and a few spades, it could be the next big thing, I could be rich - the exertion must have been taking it's toll!

Finally I got to the end and stood back to admire my efforts... Nope - no going back now!

Turf - Gone!

Next step was to lay a heavy duty weed control membrane not helped by the breeze that up until that point had been helping to keep me cool through the unusual bout of physical labour.

Keeping the weeds at bay.

Once the membrane was in position, it was covered with gravel of which I had plenty to choose from and as a bonus stopped the wind from taking it every two minutes, post holes where excavated (by which point I was developing a serious loathing for heavy clay soil) and PostCrete used to set the supports for the decking support frames. If your looking to concrete posts into place I have to recommend PostCrete - it's really simple and quick to use, dig the hole (the hard bit), place in the post - I placed gravel under the post to aid drainage given the heavy soil we have here, pour in the PostCrete then simply add water on top, check the post is straight and support if neccessay - ten minutes later it''s done - why isn't everything that simple?

By this point my muscles felt like lead, and I could feel myself stiffening up, the promise of a cold beer or two followed by a hot bath was to much to resist and looking at my handywork I figured I'd earned it!