A couple of years after we moved into the house on Stoddard, my parents decided they needed a patio. They loved to barbecue, and wanted a really nice patio, with a barbecue pit, picnic table and outdoor chairs. Of course, having such a thing built costs lots of money, so they decided to build it themselves.
First, my dad and I went down to the local hardware store to pick up everything we needed. We got a couple of dozen bags of cements and concrete. The concrete was for the slab, and the cement was to finish it up.
My dad also purchase a few hundred red bricks, and some tools. We stuffed all this into the back of the car, and went home.
The next thing to do was to clear the area and build a form. This meant several hours of digging, pulling up grass and smoothing dirt. I noticed that dad was being careful to preserve my favorite play area - the mudhole and treehouse up against the back of the house.
We built a form from some thin wood, and mixed up the concrete. This was great fun, as I could now get filthy with my parent’s permission.
Dad poured the concrete into the form, and smoothed it all over with the trowel. It came out pretty good, except for a few minor dips and bulges.
The next day, he added all of the brick. First, he built the barbecue pit. It was a large pit, carefully constructed to take the smoke away from the house. Dad then laid down all of the bricks onto the concrete slab. After that, he mixed the cement, and filled in all of the spaces between the bricks, carefully, so as not to deface the fronts.
After the cement dried, we had a fantastic patio, complete with barbecue. We spent many happy hours on that patio, eating barbecued hamburgers and steaks, happily lying in the hot summer sun.
Unless otherwise noted, all photos and text is Copyright © Richard G Lowe, Jr.