Last summer I bought a small lake house. It is a fixer upper and the plan is to spend a couple of years working on various projects to get the house up to it’s charming potential.

One of the projects is to get the front yard actually looking like a front yard. Previous owners and renters had turned it into a make shift circle drive where they would park their cars. I thought it made the place look trashy. There is plenty of room to park several cars parallel to the street or down by the storage shed.

So Phase One of the front yard project is to build a walk from the front door out to the street. As is, the circle drive is dirt and anytime it rains we have to jump around mud puddles to get into the house.

We looked at the options and decided to go with a d.i.y. concrete mold. Simply mix a bag of concrete, pour it in the mold, smooth it out and repeat over and over again. We picked a country stone pattern to keep with the charm of the house.

By the 3rd week in February we had several days of really nice spring like weather and I was able to wear shorts for the first time this year. So that Sat., Feb 22nd,  I decided to start the Rock Walk project.

Weekend #1 – Feb. 22nd & 23rd

It was the first time I ever worked with concrete and the first two pours didn’t look perfect but I got the hang of it pretty quick. I guess that’s why it’s called Quikcrete. LOL. Several bags into the project I felt like I had figured out the right consistency of the concrete and had developed a smoothing technique that had the stones looking fairly natural.

It took me about 5 hours to do 5 bags which is pretty slow in my estimation. I originally thought I was only going to do one row of molds but once I got the first couple down the walk was too narrow for my liking. So I decided I wanted to do two rows for a wider path. That decision combined with how slow I was going meant I wasn’t getting this done in one day. I hoped to continue and possibly finish the following weekend.

Weekend #2 – Mar. 1st & 2nd

The day I started working on the walk the air had turned chilly again. I should have know that was a sign of things to come. During the following week the temps kept dropping and by the weekend winter was back.

At least I was able to create enough of a walk to keep us out of the mud most of the way up to the house but I had to put the project on hold until warmer weather came back.

The icy conditions stuck around for a couple of days but had thawed by mid week and by the end of the first week of March I was able to get back to work on the walk.

Weekend #3 – Mar. 8th & 9th

On Saturday, Mar. 8th, I was able to pour enough molds to extend the path out to almost double it’s length. I stopped early afternoon because of a threat of rain with the plan of finishing up on Sunday.

I didn’t want to waste the rest of Saturday so that afternoon I did yard work. I worked on some more of the limbs that had fell during the winter. I cut the larger ones into firewood and burned the smaller ones. In doing so I wore myself out and ended up sleeping most of the day on Sunday.

Weekend #4 – Mar. 8th & 9th

The following weekend, Mar. 8 & 9th, had rain in the forecast again. Since it would not be good to pour any molds in wet conditions  I decided to plant some grass seeds. I was needing grass to grow back and fill in the circle drive and I was hoping to take advantage of mother nature naturally watering my lawn to kick start the process.

On Saturday morning I used a spreader and dispersed some seeds then covered the seeds with peat moss. That evening a nice, easy rain came and soaked everything. But by Sunday morning the rain was coming down hard and heavy and I was worried everything I had done the day before was going to get washed away. By that evening the rain had turned to snow giving us yet another wintry day.  Fortunately the temps weren’t low enough for it to cause any problems. Since it takes the grass a week or two to sprout I won’t know if the heavy rains did more harm than good.

Weekend #5 – Mar 15th & 16th

I can’t remember why I didn’t work this weekend and I failed to take any notes.

Weekend #6 – Mar. 22nd & 23rd

This weekend I had a friend getting married on Saturday which tied up most of the day so I was unable to get any work done. Sunday I took it easy and we went to a matinee movie, Divergent.

Weekend #7 – Mar. 29th & 30th

I was finally able to pour some new molds this weekend. I began a second row of stones which doubled the width of the walk.

I poured both in the morning and in the afternoon up into the evening. The morning stones turned out fine but apparently it got very chilly that evening and the one’s I poured in the afternoon didn’t harden up as quick so a few cracked while taking several days to  completely harden.

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There is a gap between the walk and the house. I want them to connect so I experimented by pouring some molds all the way up to the house. I did not remove the square rock thingies that were already in place and just poured the molds over the top of them. As a result the stones were too high and prevented the door from opening so i had to remove them. Like I said, this was an experiment and I was fully prepared to undo what I did if it didn’t work out. Next time I will pull up the square thingys then pour the molds.

It felt like I did a lot of work but didn’t seem like much was accomplished. There was rain on Sunday which prevented me from working so we went to a matinee movie, Noah.

Weekend #8 – April 5th & 6th

We had rain and cooler temps this weekend which prevented any work getting done. This was actually good as I was needing to spend time working on federal tax stuff for the family business. Took it easy on Sunday and saw a matinee movie, Captain America!

Weekend #9 – April 12th & 13th

Rain in the forecast again. Saturday was nice enough to do some work so I mowed the lawn for the first time this year. I also did a second round of grass seeds and once again it came a hard rain on Sunday.

I’ll have to wait and see if the hard rain washed my grass seeds away but it revealed a drainage problem due to the slope of the yard. The slope basically funnels all the rain water run off straight into my front door. It was good to discover this now as I can create some sort of drainage system to correct this when I pull up the square rock thingies to pour the molds that connect the walk to the house.

Weekend #10 – April 19th & 20th

I was able to work on the walk on Sunday the 20th. I pulled up one row of square rock thingies and poured one row of molds to close the gap between the walk and the front door. Now I only have to pour one more row to connect the walk to the house. I also was able to pour enough molds to double the width of the walk to almost the end.

Weekend #11 – April 26th & 27th

No work on the walk this weekend. Saturday was beautiful so I got the boat out and went to the lake to do a little fishing. Caught enough fish to make it a fun afternoon. Sunday was a very lazy day as we just sat back and watched all the severe weather pass through. Three different storms dumped major rain on the yard all washed away all my grass seeds. Again.

Weekend #12 – May 3rd & 4th

On Saturday morning I mowed the lawn. I’m not having any results with the grass seeds I spread. There is little patches of grass popping up here and there where the drive used to be but i’m pretty sure it’s not even the seed I planted just old grass that’s re-sprouting.

On Sunday I was able to pour the molds that connected the walk to the house.  YAY! Now the only thing left is to even out the end of the walk and it will be done. I am contemplating painting the stones so that it looks more natural and less like cement. That afternoon we went to the movies to see “The Amazing SpiderMan 2”.

Weekend #13 – May 10th & 11th

I didn’t do any work on the walk this weekend. Saturday morning we had to get up bright and early to head to Conway for a Women Run Arkansas 5K event Kris was participating in. After that we went to eat at Chili’s. Normally we would make a day of it and hit up flea markets, because they have a lot of them down there, but all we wanted to do was come back home and nap. We are getting so old.

The next day was mothers day and we spent the afternoon at my out-laws house. We had grilled hamburgers and hot dogs and all the fixings. I went down to the pond that I stocked the year before (Feb 2013 blog) and caught a bunch of little bluegills. The ticks ate me up.

Weekend #14 – May 17th & 18th

We had a lot of rain in the forecasts for this week so I built a temporary retaining wall to see if that would fix my draining issues. It seemed to work fine so now the plan is to build some flower beds on both sides of the walk to block rain water run off from streaming straight down to the front door when we have heavy rains.

Again, I didn’t do any work on the walk this weekend. Saturday was a shopping day and that evening we celebrated my brother’s and nephew’s birthdays with a cook out. Sunday was a lazy day. The highlight of the day was going to the movies to see “Godzilla”.

Update: July 2014

Here’s a pic of the Walk in July. The grass has filled in the old drive way. I still haven’t finished  where the walk begins and I probably won’t until I start work on the flower beds. I hope to do that some time in the fall.

Update: March 2015

 

I put some concrete blocks along each side of the walk to frame it in just to see how it would look. I still want to do the flower beds but I have so many other projects needing attention. I figured this would be a quick, easy fix until then.

This is a link to a neat trick to stain the concrete I’d like to try . Click Here.

The project is to be continued …