The Backyard - An Update

Now that we have been in the Frosthaus for a couple summers, our changes are starting to take root. Its a slow process getting gardens to mature, especially when you remove everything and start from scratch. Even moreso when your spring has been chock-a-block with activities that prevent you from getting out and maintaining the gardens.

In any case, lets look back before we look ahead.

This picture was taken shortly before we moved into the house in 2012:

The backyard is struggling to grow grass, the wooden retaining wall is rotten and failing, and, well, its a sad place. 

Last year we spent a pile of time on landscaping and put in new retaining walls, pool deck, pool liner, coping, gardens, a playground for kids, and fence posts. We never got around to the fence. Its still on my to-do list.

So far this spring we haven't done much at all back there. We did spread some grass seed, and we may make the odd tour to weed gardens, but as things take hold, the gardens are starting to perform as intended. That makes me happy. In a couple more years we should see the gaps fill in. In the pics below, I just pointed and shooted. It was lunch and I had no time to tidy up back there. Also our pool steps have caused me much greif this spring, so they are still lyin gon the deck beside the pool. They have moved since the last photo though. 

Backyard Then and Now

This weekend it was time to close the pool, which is a shame since I never got around to an 'After' pic of the yard after all our work on it. We can't really call these 'after' pics since we still haven't figured out how we are connecting paths from the house to the pool and we don't have a lawn, but here it is today. It has changed a bunch back there, and overall I think we are all pleased with things.

So here is what the yard looked like 14 months ago when we bought the house:

Come to think of it... we may have more lawn now than there was back then. Note the use of rotted timbers as a retaining wall, the beauty of the cedar trees overhanging the pool, and the cracked and heaved concrete deck. Pic below is late last summer with the pool opened and goldenrod in bloom.

Here it is today...

Since these pictures were taken during pool closing, the stairs are up on end etc. but you can at least get a feel for the scale of the work that has taken place this summer.

So far we have removed and replaced all plantings along the fence, including building and planting an espaliered apple orchard (14 trees from Siloam Orchards) as detailed here. For foundation plantings we have a mix of Hardy hydrangea, daylily, hostas (suffering due to too much sun), iris - at least 3 varieties - and a bunch of other stuff mostly rescued from our last house, or from the beds when we dug them out. 

Fenceline Garden and deck:

We removed the deck ourselves and had it replaced with Brooklin Brick products. The border is Barnboard Pavers and the field is something that was on the discount pile. Not sure what the intended colour or pattern was, but the price was right. Hardscaping was done by Ryan at Dreamscape Landscaping, with materials sourced by us.

The pool coping and liner was replaced by Ewing Pools, using stock coping (not sure what the pattern is) and a Gulf Coast Gold Pebble liner from Premier. Although the water isn't perfect you can see the pattern pretty well in the pic below. This liner does an outstanding job of hiding algae, which comes as a mixed blessing. It's nice that the algae doesn't show, but it's embarrassing when you jump in and the bottom is slimy. We need to vac the pool more regularly.

The new retaining wall was installed by us using Colonial Buff block from Brooklin Brick. It is nice having a locally produced product with a retail outlet on premises. We used the barnboard as our capstone for the wall.

An ongoing challenge for us will be the chipmunk colony that had undermined the previous pool deck. They are still there, despite the disturbances of the reno. Talking to neighbours, we can expect them to stay for some time. It seems as though chipmunks have always been part of this neighbourhood.

A final shot showing the view from the shallow end - including the pipe draining the pool, cloudy water due to closing schemicals, and the floaties from the trees losing their leaves.

In the spring we will be completing the fence, building a pool shed, and hopefully have a new lawn. We may also expand the patio where the BBQ is for better function, and put up a pergola across the back of the house. Thats all in the 'maybe' file for now though.

The Pool Dudes Came!

When I got home from work the other night, a shocking discovery was waiting for me - someone had stolen the pool!

The guys from the pool place (we switched teams and Ewing Pools is doing this work for us) had come while I was at work and stripped out hte liner to get ready to put in a new liner. So Exciting. In other news, I need to get the rest of that concrete outta there in preparation for the pool guys to do the rest of their work.

Not sure how my back feels about that.

At the same time that the pool dudes arrived, I booked a new air conditioner for the house. That should arrive next week, which will make me super-happy. Yay, good news rocks.

A Smashing Good Time

I present the next installment in the backyard chronicles... At this point I am finally ready to work on the pool proper. its kindof like Indiana Jones finally reaching the Arc of the Covenant.the first task in this phase is to cut back the concrete deck from the pool. I marked a cut line 10" back from the coping, and set to work with a rented walk-behind saw... The water is lovely, dive right in...

There was hardly any dust, but the saw was very noisy, and the mix of water and concrete grindings left a slick slurry on the deck. After about 5 or 6 hours, I had cut through the concrete deck all the way around the pool, and made a couple extra passes on the side of the pool with all the hardware and the worst slope.

This slab was poured in 1978, which puts it at 35 years old. It is over fine sand. Wire mesh was laid on the sand for the pour, but the wire mesh / concrete interface is patchy. in some spots the wire mesh is embedded in the concrete by about 1" in others it is lying in the sand just below the concrete.

The concrete itself is actually quite good with few cracks. I believe the 'chemistry' in the pour was good. Today a colony of chipmunks has moved in under the slab and is vigorously tunneling  They need to be eradicated, but the neighbour's bird feeder is a good food source for them so I don't see them moving along without a pile of encouragement from my side.

The failure mode of the concrete appears to be that the sand washed out from under the slab. On 3 sides of the pool there is a gap between the bottom of the slab and the sand ranging from  2" to 8" or more. These gaps run the full length of the pool (16' X 32') and extend back from the pool wall by 18" to 2 ft. The edge of the slab away from the pool has settled by 4" over 3 ft on the worst side. Adjacent to the pool, the slab is sitting on the pool wall.

After I was done with the saw, I pulled out my sledge hammer and mattock, and set to work removing the concrete.

You can see a 'cave' under the slab in the last photo above. It turns out that the entire deck was being held up by the pool wall since the sand had all washed out from underneath. Here is what it looks like of you stick  a camera in there:

After about 12 hours with the sledge and mattock I have only another 20 sf of concrete to remove. Yay. All of this had to go so the pool company could come in and remove the coping and liner to replace it all. Once they are done their work, it will be time to really get excited. In the meantime, here is what it looks like on each side of the pool...

North side:

South side:

East side:

And my favourite... West Side:

I think I drank my body weight in water, and sweated it all right back out again. Busting up concrete is some hard work!For my next job, I need to get some wood to use as form boards, and set up what the edge of the pool deck will look like, all ready for backfilling with gravel.

The Brick Man Cometh

When I got home yesterday, I almost hit a skid of bricks sitting in the middle of the driveway. Then Cuppa came running to my truck and told me the brick man came in his big crane and put bricks in our driveway. Then Buddy ran over and told me there were bricks here when he got home from school. I guess that explains how the bricks got there.

Yup. Brooklin brick came through. You may remember back a while ago I went with a friend to Brooklin's yard in, well, Brooklin Ontario, and bought up a pile of seconds. Bricks that weren't perfect, and we placed them in the backyard. I haven't updated that project in about a week, but in the interim, we have finished our base course of brick, backfilled with gravel, and laid in drainage. One lunch hour last week, I returned to Brooklin and like a real customer, ordered full priced brick for the rest of the wall.

We have just gotten those bricks. When I went into the backyard, Chuck and Mama had already carted almost half the bricks back there, and laid them out ready to be set in place. In a couple hours I was able to lay almost all the bricks. Before leaving for work this morning I carted another 30 or so bricks back. We only have about 60 bricks left to move into the backyard, and I haven't gotten a picture of the delivery yet!

EDIT: I got a (bad) pic!

Our wall will be colonial buff standard split face design wall with barnboard coping. I think I'll wait for the big reveal until we get all the bricks in place and the gardens planted. Then we still won't have a lawn, but at least the framework for the landscaping will be in place. I am really pleased with how it looks so far though.

When I went into the backyard, Chuck and Mama had already carted almost half the bricks back there, and laid them out ready to be set in place. In a couple hours I was able to lay almost all the bricks. Before leaving for work this morning I carted another 30 or so bricks back.

In other news, a big surprise is waiting for the boys once all the brick is in place... Stay tuned.

Digging Down, Building Up

SO by now you should have a feel for the scope of our retaining wall project.

After days of digging, we finally reached the shed, and it was time to start doing something new...

After all that digging, everyone was about worn out!

With the sod and topsoil removed from the site, we needed to address the pool plumbing issues. If we leave the pool pipes in their current location, they will be buried in a sandbox, and a pain to get at for future servicing. Besides, they're in the way for our retaining wall work!

Getting at the pipes meant breaking up the Concrete pool stairs and a part of the pool deck.

The stairs really didn't want to move, and it was a lot of work to get them out. The pool deck at this spot has been overlaid with a few lifts of concrete to try and level it in the past. I think this is the most invasive surgery its seen though.

With the stairs removed, we lifted the pipes from their spot in the future sandbox. The pile of concrete rubble was a pain in the but to work around, but we managed.

Here you can see the structure of the pool. The plastic coping is exposed with the concrete removed, and the Tee fitting that sends water from the pump to the pool jets is sticking out of the sand. We will be recycling the sand from this area and moving it to other parts of the yard as we go.

With the pipes removed, we levelled out the sandbox, and finished running conduit for future electric work. 

Electric all roughed in, and its time to start laying blocks.

The base course of the keystone blocks for the wall went in really slowly. As I went I got better and faster at it, but working on this was very tedious and time consuming. At first it was taking me about 10 - 15 minutes per block. By the time we were done the base course, I could lay a block in 3-5 minutes. Sometimes less.

Lotsa bricks in, and the Big-O drainage pipe in place. I don't think we needed the one with the filter on it, but it only cost us an extra $10, so what the heck.

One of our challenges with the electric was that where the conduit crosses the wall, I needed to cut a chase in the block. I used a concrete blade in a skil saw to cut a few grooves, then chiseled out the material. When I test fit it, the groove was too shallow and the box didn't fit in the groove.

To make everything fit, I went back and chiseled out a recess for the box to sit in. No one will ever see this, but I'm kindof proud of how nicely it worked out.

With the electric roughed in, I turned my attention to the plumbing. The pool lines need to go under the wall, and will eventually be run back into the pool shed. I used pieces of the Big-O pipe to make a 'subway' that allows the pool plumbing to go under the wall. The chases mean that if we ever have to replace the pipes, we won't have to take down the wall to do it. We have painted the top of the subway blocks with white paint in case we need to find the spot again someday.

The trickiest part of all this was getting that base layer flat and even all the way across. I'll post a video shortly that shows how we did that once we got a good technique down.

The Pool Gods Hate Me.

Last night I was feeling pretty good about my trenching and being thankful I was never at Dieppe or Vimy or anyplace in a world war. In fact I was happy that my little one foot deep trench was progressing across the yard at the rate it was when I found myself at the pool return line. It was made of thick white plastic, and as soon as I found it I switched from digging with my spade to digging with a trowel, carefully exposing the pipe.

Once the return line was daylighted, I continued with my trench, and a few feet later, I came across the 2 lines running to the jets. Where the return line was of a heavy, white plastic, these lines were black plastic, bundled together. As soon as the soil was lifted from them, the pipes began to weep water and a trickle from them formed a small puddle in the trench.

Ugh. Looks like the lines should be replaced. Its good that I discovered the condition of the lines now, before all the work on the deck and retaining wall are in place, but this will mean extra work with the excavation of the lines, and placement of new ones. On the other hand, with the replacement of the lines, the pool should be in good shape to operate trouble-free for the foreseeable future. Or something.

A surprise with the pool returns was that they were all laid on the clay and backfilled with regular fill. On municipal projects we would backfill a hose with a forgiving material like rock dust or sand. Something without any rocks, and without anything sharp or abrasive in the material. At this point my plan is to expose the pool lines all the way back to the shed, replace with new, and backfill with sand.

This will likely add about $200 to the project, but hopefully will allow us to rest easy about the lines. Also for future yardwork, the sand will act as a warning that we are near the pool lines and prevent us from cutting into them with random backyard digging.

 This will add another 25 feet of trenching to the project. I'm getting pretty good at this stuff.

Too much to do, Too little Time

Since spring is in the air, its boat launch season, and its pool opening season, and its back yard reno season, and its gardening, vacation planning, and NHL playoffs season (Go Habs Go!)

Yesterday the pool guys came over at lunchtime and scratched their chins while looking at the pool.

They shared some pretty good news, but everything came with caveats. Going from worst to best here are the scenarios for the pool...

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Worst Case:

The most expensive way to do what we want to do is to drain the pool, cut back the concrete deck by about a foot, remove the concrete and unscrew the coping from the steel walls. Replace the liner and coping and reassemble. Cost to do this would be start around $5500.

Better Case:

The next best case would be to detach the liner, letting it fall into the pool, cut back the concrete deck by about a foot, remove the concrete and unscrew the coping from the steel walls. Replace the coping and reattach the liner. If the liner tears or stretches out of shape in the process, see previous paragraph. Budget for this is around $3000

Best case:

Leave the coping on the sides, but cut back a keystone shape at each corner (carefully) allowing access to the broken corners. Remove and replace the corner pieces. The stretched liner in the corners can be reattached using steam to stretch the liner and glue, if the pool is drained before they arrive. Budget for this is under $500

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So I am aiming for the best case (although I should be honest and say that a new liner would look really nice). The pool guys also saved us money by pointing out that rather than having them pump the leafs out of the pool, we could do it ourselves by attaching a "leaf bagger" to our garden hose. We will give that a try before hiring someone. International has saved us a pile of cash in this house call, and I am very appreciative. We will stop by the store in the next couple days to book the crew for the liner reattachment and to buy a leaf bagger.

In other news, we worked out our estimate of bricks for the retaining wall in front of the pool. It looks like we are about to buy 7 skids of interlocking brick. and 10 yards of gravel. Then I will get a case of beer and watch as Chuck installs the wall. OK, that beer part won't happen, but the bricks sure will. Maybe one weekend we will have a wall party and play Pink Floyd. You're invited.

In case you are wondering where the wall is going, there is a pink string across the backyard. It is our imaginary wall.

The reason that all I got done on the yard last night is a mittful of calculations and a pink string, is because the boat has to go in the water on Saturday (which means the wall won't get started then either). Since the boat has to go in the water on Saturday, I stole SWMBO and the boys away to the yacht club and we emptied the boat so it would have the best chance of getting from its trailer to the lake once the cranes arrive. The truck is now full of boat, the boat is full of nothing the yard is a mess, and everything is everywhere.

While SWMBO and I were loading the boat stuff into the truck, the boys decided to go to the beach and throw rocks in the lake. Small boys everywhere love throwing rocks into lakes. Somehow in the process, they both managed to get very wet. Or as Buddy said - "I had a nice swim, but Cuppa fell in the Lake." Suuuuuuuuuure Bud, that's exactly what happened.

Pool Stuff

With the pool deck quote in hand, its time to take a look at the pool proper. Chuck and the boys got a lot of use out of the pool last year. SWMBO got good use out of it, and I dipped my toes in from time to time. But its there, so I need to get it fixed up and serviceable to match the deck.

When we tried to remove the cover this spring, all the leafs on it slumped into the pool, and now we have a mess on our hands. I may call in a pool company to clean it up and get it open.

But this isn't about that.

What this is about is integrating the pool work with the deck work. The pool work will involve replacing the broken sections of coping in the corners of the pool where the concrete has moved, and adjusting the height of the strainer basket and handhole.

As you can see in these photos, there is some work to be done here.

The Concrete has dropped about 4 inches over 3 feet. Hopefully our retaining wall and gardens will prevent the deck from going out of level again. The epoxy overlay we got quoted yesterday will bring things back to a 2% grade (nearly level) for drainage.

Movement in the concrete has broken all four corners of the coping. Along the sides of the pool, the coping is in pretty good shape, but I wonder if it will all need replacing to get a good colour match.

The liner itself is in pretty good shape, apart from a little fading. I hope we don't have to replace it.

A quick call to International Pools and I am happy to report that there is a riser available to adjust the height of the  handhole (Yay!) also, our coping is a stock item, and could likely be replaced fairly easily (Yay!) finally, to reattach the liner at the corners of the pool, the vinyl can be heated and stretched into place, then glued to the slot it is supposed to rest in so it won't pop back out. Labour to do all this is about $165 per hour.

I sent these photos to International, now we'll have to see what their estimate comes back at.

Back to the Espalier, and a Little about the Pool

The weather is really warming up around here. Today its supposed to be around 18°C but overcast. That means spring is in the air.

With the warm weather, I've been watching the apple tree starts for signs of life. This is a bit of a sweat it out kind of a watch. You may remember that back a few months ago the dog attacked the espalier - a totally unexpected setback, and I had to replant a few trees because of that.

So I've been watching. I replaced 2 trees that were most definitely dead, and there are a few others that I think are likely to need replacing, but at $30 each, and a long drive to get them, I am hoping these trees find a way to survive. In any case, it is with great relief that I can report some of the trees have started to leaf out. I don't have new growth yet, but I do have buds popping and tiny leafs on the twigs poking out of the ground. I am thrilled that the entire fruit tree collection isn't dead (yet). If Bernie attacks the trees again, her life will be severely shortened.

On another note, the backyard reno is continuing with the pool deck in line after fencing. Our pool deck looks like a skate park. It is all hills and valleys and broken concrete. It drops 3-1/2 inches over 3 feet along the sides, and has cracks and chunks missing in other places.

Yesterday we had a gent from Westview Contracting by to work out a quote to overlay the concrete with a rubber polymer (Rubaroc). Hopefully this will make the deck not only more esthetically pleasing, but also increase its functionality, and extend the life of the concrete base. We were considering having the concrete replaced with interlocking brick, but the rubber overlay came in $2500 cheaper (or so) and has the potential to look much better. We are trying to keep to all-cash so we are saving toward this before committing. I suspect we will have the work done late in the summer. Before we go ahead with the overlay, I also have to reach out to a pool company to figure out the logistics of adjusting the height of the strainer basket to accommodate the new overlay, and to see what can be done about the cracked coping around the pool, and the liner stretching out in the corners.

Always more work to be done! In the interim I continue to build fence parts...

If you are following the espalier, try this link for our next update!