The Fence: Panels + Lattice = Completion

Happy Monday to you all! I hope you had a lovely Memorial Day weeked (last weekend) and a lovely 4-day work week after that. I know we were super busy, but had a lot of fun and relaxation time.

Over the course of that long weekend, Joey did complete work on our fence! Only a few details remain - which I will get to - but I figured you might want to see what the end results look like. So, here are a hundred pictures to capture the changes!

I left off with the individual planks being screwed into the horizontal boards to create what looks like a panel from the inside of the fence...

Joey notched out the end post to get the fence tight with the side of the house. Very precise. We don't want puppies or kitties or anything else slipping through the cracks!

Joey worked his way down the fence very methodically. It was a pretty speedy process putting the cut-to-length boards up.

Next to go on was the gate on the west side of the house.

Joey built the gates to blend right in with the fence. Only the bottom is cut differently so that there is room for the gate to swing open.

In the picture below, you can see the horizontal board that goes across the panels on the back of the gate - for added security. We don't want boards falling off!

At this stage, I was starting to get really excited, but at the same time I was a little nervous the fence might not be tall enough. We were aiming for the privacy panels to go up 4 feet and the lattice on top to add an additional foot for total of 5 feet in height. But with the way our yard slopes a little and how high the house sits above the ground, I worried there might not be enough privacy. But Joey assured me it'd fine. So, I waited.

Next up? Boards that run across the top of the panels to cap off the planks of wood. It gives the fence a very finished look.

Then Joey routed grooves in this cap board and the posts so that the lattice would sit inside the boards slightly.

Finally it was time for the lattice to be cut and installed. Joey used a pair of saw horses to steady the lattice. Then a chalk line to measure the height needed. Then he used a circular saw to cut the lattice as needed...

The lattice fit right into the grooves he created. PERFECT!

I missed some photos of this whole phase in the process, but basically he put the lattice in all the way around the fence and then put one final piece of wood on top of the lattice to cap it all off. This piece of wood also had a little groove in it to fit the lattice into it...

Note: Ignore the splintered wood. It will get sanded before painting happens (way down the road).

And here is the finished product! It's amazing to me what a difference it makes to our newly-defined back yard space. I keep saying that over and over because it's so true. The height even ended up being perfect. Not too private - we want to be able to stand up and look over the fence if need, plus not block off too much of the house from the street view - but private enough so that we can sit around our new little fire pit (seen below) or have kids running around the yard and people driving/walking by won't see it all.

Notice that Joey even got the screws in each board to line up perfectly! I love a detail-oriented, perfectionistic (is that a word???) husband. :)

We kept the fence 12 inches off the sidewalk and driveway for extra breathing space. Glad we did that. I can park and exit the car with no troubles. You can see below that we did bring the gate out to meet the driveway. So, there's a little bump-out there. That was necessary for the gate to line up with the garage.

I love that we decided to include the side entrance of the house into the fenced in yard. Not only does it make the back yard space seem bigger, but it's super convenient for letting the dog in and out of the house.

It also makes the "front door" of the house less confusing. With 3 entrances (the front, side, and back porch), people didn't know where to go. Now the true "front" of the house will be more obvious since the side and back entrances are enclosed.

Pretty nifty for being done all within a couple weeks? I just love the look! Once we get some plants/bushes/flowers planted in the new mulch beds we created last summer, it will look even better.

Now, there are two parts of this fence project that are not completed. One being the latches for both gates. We're not exactly sure how that's going to come together. For now, Joey screwed up little blocks of wood to turn and keep the gates from swinging open. I'll show you final results on that once we have a solution.

The second part yet to complete is the painting of the fence. Green-treated wood has to sit and "dry out" for about 6+ MONTHS. So, we're looking at next summer to paint the fence white. That should work out well though given we also want to replace the siding on the garage and back porch next summer.

In the meantime, we'll enjoy the fence as is! We've already used the yard 100% more than we did before the fence went up. Memorial weekend was great with parties and s'mores over the new fire pit.

Note to viewers: Put something that can tolerate heat UNDER your fire pit so it doesn't burn your grass. Whoops!

Now tell me your thoughts! What do you think of the fence? Anything you would do differently? We're smitten.

Pssst... If you want to see prior blog posts on the fence, click here, here, and here.

The Fence: (Stop) Oh yes, Wait a Minute Mr. Post-man!

If you’re familiar with The Carpenters (not my husband, but the musical artists), you’ll have that song in your head the rest of the day. Anyhoo…

I’m back with an update on the fence project. Let me tell ya, it’s come a long way very quickly.

I left you hanging with the fence post holes dug and the posts getting set up in said holes. Here’s the layout of the holes/posts/soon-to-be-fence….

Being on a small corner lot, it wraps around the back and side yard to create one “area”. It makes a huge difference in the feel of the space, but more on that later.

Following the hole-digging, the guys took the bags of concrete we purchased and mixed the concrete with water in a wheelbarrow to create cement and that was subsequently poured around the base of the posts. Joey filled up each hole about 3/4 of the way. That equaled about 3 feet of cement. These posts ain’t goin’ nowhere!

Joey used a level to make sure the post was straight up and down – not leaning left to right or front to back. Then he used 2 scrap pieces of wood – lightly nailed to the post – to ensure it stayed upright…

Then he was able to string 2 pieces of pink string across all the posts and use that to help make sure they were all level with one another. It seemed to work pretty well.

The guys worked their way down the line, post by post – securing each post with wood sticks as they went…

They even kept their smiles up while mixing and pouring all those bags of concrete.

The entire process – digging the holes and setting the posts – took about 5 hours. The concrete started to cure right away, but we let the posts sit for 2 days to ensure they were secure.

So, fast-forward to 2 days later… Joey removed all the scrap wood attached to the posts, and then began the next steps – filling the remaining quarter of all the post holes with dirt (and collecting leftover dirt in a pile to haul away) and then attaching the horizontal boards along the posts. This cleaned things up quite a bit.

Joey actually started by cutting the top of the posts so that they were all the same height. Then he measured from the top of the posts down to determine where the boards should go. We wanted to be sure they were level across all the posts. The top board is about 4 feet above the ground – which is how high we want the paneled part of the fence to go. The bottom board is about 6 inches from the ground.

Small brackets were screwed into the posts at the exact heights and then the horizontal boards were screwed into the brackets.

With these boards in place, the fence panels began to fly up! Each panel screwed into the upper and lower horizontal boards to create and mostly private fence up to 4 feet…

I’m gonna stop here. More pics to come with all the panels in place, hand-made gates hung at the entrances, and what’s next!

The Fence: Hole-y Cow!

It's been a couple weeks since my last update. So, I thought I'd clue you in on where we stand with the whole new fence situation. The orange marks seen above sat there until this past weekend when Joey, his brother Justin, and a neighbor friend who has (thanks to his job) some awesome landscaping equipment got started on the actual process of building - from scratch - a new fence. This means no pre-put-together fence panels, but instead purchasing a lot of different boards that somehow come together to make a less-expensive version of a fence. I don't know how Joey makes the magic happen, but he does.

Here are a few of the materials purchased...

1. Posts that will stick in the ground and boards to run horizontally from post to post

2. Bags of concrete to mix in a wheelbarrow and pour to secure the fence posts

3. Individual panels that will get nailed to the horizontal boards

There are some brackets, nails and other necessities too, but I don't have a pic of those items.

The first order of business was digging the holes where Joey had spray painted the orange "x" marks in the first picture above. Our neighbor friend had some sort of fabulous hole-digging machine to do this. Joey just had to be sure it got lined up properly and push down on the top of it to make it go into the dirt.

I initially watched through my living room window - watching the dirt spill out all over the lawn. It left a pretty little hole...

I walked away thinking this would be a neat little hole-making process. But when I returned a few minutes later, the scene looked like this...

I was a little worried that the yard was being destroyed, but I kept quiet and let the boys do their job. Pretty soon there were holes dug all around the perimeter of the yard...

Digging the post holes right by the driveway and patio was a little complicated as they had to get super close without hitting any of the concrete. I watched with my eyes closed...

It was successful with just a tiny bit of plastic drain pipe shredded. No biggie.

Then they moved on to finish the rest of the holes along the driveway. In the meantime, Justin started clearing dirt away from the holes to prep for the posts to be set and concrete poured.

The holes are actually much deeper than I thought they would be. 3-4 feet maybe?! I made sure not to drop my phone or camera down there. That's something I would do...

Well, within about 1-2 hours, the hole-making process was completed. The next step? Setting and cementing the fence posts...

...something I know nothing about. But I'll show you what it looked like! Stay tuned.

We're Fencing

Well, we're planning (and starting) to put up a fence in our back/side yard. It's a plan that's been in the works since we bought the house 2 years ago. When we poured our new patio last fall, we knew that the next step of the outdoor-makeover would be the fence.

So, here we are in the spring of 2012 with a new puppy and in desperate need of a fence for containing her and for some privacy in the yard. We are on a super duper tight budget for this. Like pennies. So, we can't do anything fancy. We're leaning towards all-practical with room to embellish later on if additional funds roll in.

As a way of reminder, here is the new bare-as-bones patio...

And here was a tiny list of the many, many things that still needed to be accomplished in the surrounding area...

Joey actually got started on the sinking-steps problem before winter hit. I'll have more on that in a separate post.  The pile of junk got thrown out and the wood pile moved to the opposite side of the porch by our neighbor's fence.  The dirt/grass issue was taken care of by regrading the side lawn and planting new grass. It was super easy, and the new grass grew in fast before winter came. It's a little patchy, but we can fix that this summer. So, here is the layout of our tiny back/side yard.

Joey has started marking wear the post will go. The fence will sit about a foot in from the driveway and sidewalk in order to leave more walking room for people. We're going to wrap the fence around by the side door of the house. This door leads right down to the basement wear the puppy's kennel is kept. So, letting her in and out from this entrance will be easy. There will be a little gate in front of the side walk way for anyone wanting to enter the yard from this point.

Rose will love not having to be on her leash. She'll be free to roam the yard and patio area and see the dog next door. They already talk to each other when they're both outside. And they have play time together EVERY day. I don't even get play time with my friends every day. Lucky pup.

Joey got a head start on this project without me even knowing it (until I saw it completed). He actually started on the opposite side of the patio - both behind the garage and to the right side of the porch.

Behind the garage was a disaster zone. A lot of leftover boards, materials, and junk were piled on the grass-less ground. Joey cleared it all out, laid down new sod, and then added a fence panel at the far end to prevent Rose from wandering to the neighbors on the other side of the garage....

Ignore the peeling paint. The garage and porch siding will eventually be replaced.

Here is the other side of that same panel (I snuck up the neighbor's driveway to take the pic)...

Joey used green-treated wood panels and nailed them into the 2X4 boards he put up. The "green" coloring will eventually disappear, and I'd like to white-wash the fence for a clean, bright finish. Again, this is the cheapest, yet most-durable lumber we could afford.

Meanwhile, on the side of the back porch, Joey got busy installing a gate. He laid down some boards on the dirt for now, but we'll either lay down sod or possibly landscaping stones later. The gate will make access easy to this side of the house, and it allows for our neighbors to easily enter the backyard to take Rose over play time each day. We love our neighbors!

I caught him mid-project, but you can see that he put up posts and the gate frame first. The frame came with hinges to use and everything. So, it was a pretty simple follow-the-instructions kind of process.

Then panels were nailed to the frame to fill in the space. Joey still has to get the latch attached for it to hook to the neighbor's fence.

You can see the gate comes up to Joey's ribs. The fence will be a little bit higher than that. And we're planning to added some decorative lattice or something like that to the top of the fence. So, that will make it seem even higher.

Puppy will hopefully enjoy the freedom of roaming the yard (eventually)...

The next step will be digging post holes, pouring concrete, and getting the fence posts in place.

Joey is planning to start that project not this weekend, but the next weekend. So, I'll have more pictures when the time comes, but we're planning on using the same green-treated wood panels that were installed here. Again, I hope to paint it all white some day, but at least for now we'll have some privacy and dog-roaming room.