Monday, June 29, 2015

More work on the rock patio

We did some more work on the rock patio. Boy is that tough! Rocks are really heavy, you know? So glad we've got the tractor, but even so, the final positioning is usually done by hand. Let's hear it for leverage!
Love that backhoe
The spot I chose for the garden is working out great (warning - garden update coming soon) so I wanted to run a water line out to it. I hated the idea of a hose stretched out across the patio all the time so we decided to bury a line. We didn't go deep - we'll just blow out the line each fall so we don't have to worry about it freezing. 

The water spigot is midway down the house and we needed it about 60 feet away.  
The spigot is very far away
We dug a shallow trench, ran out some Pex, and then started placing rocks so that they'd help hold the water line in place. Chris built me a couple boxes to both support and hide the water lines above ground where they'd connect to the house and eventually to the soaker hose.
Digging for the line
We connected one spigot directly to the Pex, buried a post and guide box, and then buried the line. We used a hose connector to join that spigot with the house spigot so I've got lots of control over water flow and I can hook up extra hoses if I want. I have vague and unformed ideas of eventually hooking up a garden sink out here so I can use it to rinse my veggies so I really didn't want to limit my options.
Post, box, and line in place
A few of the rocks were too thick so I got out my trusty rock chisels and split them. What a hoot!

Whack
Crack!
Took us most of the afternoon, but we got the line buried, the posts sunk, and the rocks laid. We even managed to find a rock big enough to set the grill on.

Can't see the Pex, can ya? Woot!
We decided to take a couple weeks off from patio building to work on other projects around the property. But I'm already loving the functionality of the stepping stones and really look forward to completing the yard.

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