A Backyard Makeover — Part 1
This is the story of the first phase of a backyard makeover. This part took us around 14 days of full day work. It was mainly completed by myself and my friend who does custom builds, Ford. But we also had a lot of help along the way from our wives, thank you! Everything you see, other than the house, was completed by us. Please drop a comment if you’d like to know more, or if you’d like to connect with Ford who is the custom build out business. He is open to more clients.
Our newly built house came with a reasonably landscaped front yard, complete with an irrigation system, some new trees and shrubs, and beautiful cedar chip mulch. Picture perfect! The backyard was untouched and in a somewhat rough state. This blank canvas was defined by red clay soil, an enormous quantity of volcanic and flagstone rocks, and a harsh grade (slope) from the house to the fence. Along with these challenges came some pretty incredible freebies — a mature, ponderosa pine a mere fifteen feet from the kitchen wall, two more ponderosas directly beyond our fence that borders Route 66, and a rectangular lot that could host many different backyard concepts.
I started sketching out ideas for the backyard several months before construction on the house was complete. I used SketchUp, a free online 3D rendering tool, to replicate the floor plan and lot lines to an accurate scale. This allowed me to start adding concepts to the back yard and designing them with dimensions that would make sense.
A few months ago, Lanae and I went to Hawaii with some friends and one of the highlights was the outdoor living area at our Airbnb. We ate almost every meal outside, and spent a lot of time reading and hanging out in the outdoor lounge. While the weather in Flagstaff isn’t quite as warm year round as Hawaii, there are many months where being outdoors is a real treat.
So at the top of the list of items in the backyard were an outdoor dining set and a spot for some comfortable chairs or sofas. I love fire pits and they extend the amount of time you can spend outside, so adding one to pair with the outdoor lounge chairs seemed like an easy choice. A hot tub was another addition we wanted. I’ll write a different post on the hot tub — it’s going to be a cedar hot tub that you have to assemble yourself! I wanted some element to tie together the patio set up of a dining area, a kitchen area (grill!) and the lounge area. YouTube has been a frequent stop for me during Covid and I have repeatedly seen homemade pergolas. I loved the idea of a covered patio, but without actually closing the structure off to the open air (great for seeing the stars at night, especially given that Flagstaff is a Dark Sky community). But the verticality of the pergola, along with the width of the structure, would divide the area into three clear sections: a kitchen, a dining area and a fire pit/lounge. All three would live on a pavered patio and be fairly close to the back of the house.
I’ll get into the details of how we built the pergola in a later section, but there are so many guides on YouTube and generally the internet. I did a lot of research to figure out what size lumber I needed, how to ensure structural integrity, and different design concepts. I created a 3D rendering of my proposed design to see it in a more realistic form than simple sketches, and to decide certain dimensions like the spacing between rafters or the height.
Okay! So we know what we want, now let’s get into the actual process of building it. I’ll (mostly) skip the boring parts about permits and HOA approval. My friend, Ford, came out with his wife to spend two and a half weeks helping build out the backyard. We weren’t sure exactly how much we would get done, but the goal was to try to get the patio and the pergola finished.
When we closed on the property, we got a closer look at the status of the back lot. While our dimensions were correct, I hadn’t fully appreciated the aggressive slope of the yard. Summer monsoons had also been hitting Flagstaff pretty hard, so the rain had mixed with the hard clay to form a very soft and sticky red clay that made simply walking through the yard a harder task than normal. To accomplish our goal of a pavered patio right behind the house, we needed to handle the grade of the yard. The pavers would cover a dimension of 20 feet deep from the edge of the house and about 37 feet long (the same width as the back of the house). At 20 feet from the edge of the house, the dirt was around 2 feet lower than at the edge of the house. In order to have a level, and robust, long lasting patio, we’d need to bring up the grade of the yard by installing a retaining wall and filling in the space with recycled AB concrete.
To construct the retaining wall, we used a concrete pavestone that was 4 inches tall, 11.75 inches high and 6.75 inches deep. These pavestones would match the flat pavers we eventually used for the patio. Each pavestone weighed 22 pounds and it took 250 pavestones to complete the wall, plus N paver caps. We bought the pavestones from Home Depot in multiple trips, carting them to the back yard using wheelbarrows. We learned our lesson and had the pavers delivered later on in the project. $80 seemed very worth getting to avoid carrying each stone ourselves.
To construct the retaining wall, we began by digging a ditch where the retaining wall would go. We needed the entire 37 feet base of the retaining wall to be level, which meant digging deeper on one corner than the other. Furthermore, we wanted a few inches of gravel beneath the first layer of pavestones. The first layer also needed to start beneath the original ground level. This meant that in some spots, we had to dig around 12 inches from ground level and in others, around 6 inches. We set up a string line around the edges of the eventual patio and at the height we wanted. Using levels that sit on the string helped us ensure that all four edges were level. We used the string line above the retaining wall to determine how much gravel to pour. Constructing the first layer of pavestones was tedious as every paver had to be level by itself, and with its siblings. A measuring tape, 6 inch and 48 inch level were critical tools.
After the first layer was set, the remaining 4 levels went faster. We used liquid nails to glue the stones together. We spent probably too much time on layer 2, trying to make sure they were all level to each other. But none of the concrete pavestones are identical. They all have imperfections and a slightly different shape. Some are taller or shorter than others. This means that getting them level is actually quite challenging. We used gravel under the stones to try and level them. We did this for layer 2, but then a mason who was finishing off work on the front of the house told us not to waste our time on it and rather spend that effort on the final row. The sixth layer of the wall would be the paver caps, but those would go on at the end.
One of the hardest parts of the wall was digging through heavy clay and then hitting massive rocks. We pulled out around 40 rocks that were at least as large as a soccer ball. We hit quite a few over the course of the entire project that weighed 80+ pounds and took forever to dig up. At first we threw all the rocks in a large pile, but then I used the largest rocks to make a ring around the tree in the backyard, as a bit of a feature. Usually you would have to spend some serious money on rocks like that! With a bit of rain, the rocks will get cleaned up and look great.
After finishing the wall, we took a trip to a quarry to purchase some fill gravel and paver sand. We ordered 15 tons of recycled AB concrete, which came to around 13 cubic yards, and 5 cubic yards of concrete sand. These materials arrived in a large 10 wheel dump truck! We used the recycled ab concrete, which comes in a gravel form, to fill the space in the retaining wall as well as the tree well which had been created when the foundation was dug. It was full of rocks and was far deeper than it needed to be, so that it was actually dangerous. It took around 100 cubic feet to fill the tree well. It took us over two weeks to ferry the concrete gravel from the pile on the street to the backyard. Our two wheelbarrows handle 4 cubic feet of volume each, when full. So that meant it took around 120 trips. The ladies were incredibly helpful with taking turns on wheelbarrow trips.
In between concrete gravel trips, we dug the trench for the gas lines. We had specified that a natural gas line would be installed at the rear of the house, near the kitchen. Now that we knew where the firepit and grill would go (maybe a pizza oven in the future?), we used white spray paint to draw out where the lines would go. After a trip to Home Depot, we had the materials we needed to run the gas line with an offshoot for the fire pit and one for the grill. The trench needed to be at least 12 inches deep (per code), so it took a while to dig!
After burying the gas lines with the dirt we had just dug up, it was time to dig again. However, this time we would be digging 32 inches deep. The concrete posts for the pergola need to sit below the frost line, so that moisture in the soil can’t freeze and shift the supports. In Flagstaff, the frost line is 30 inches, so we dug a bit below that and filled the base with gravel. Figuring out where the posts would go was tricky, but also really fun. We knew the approximate dimensions for the pergola and I said approximate because there were a few constraints that we couldn’t compromise on, but the width of the supports was flexible. The first constraint was the location in relation to the pavers. The pavers we were going to use were 16x16 inches — ideally we would position the concrete posts (created using 12 inch diameter concrete round forms) exactly where a paver would go. This would prevent us from having to cut any pavers to fit around the post. The other constraint was the concrete posts in relation to the windows. Ideally we wouldn’t have the posts directly outside the living room windows, occluding a view inside of the forest beyond our property. With some measuring and some math, we figured out where we’d put the posts and the overall distance between the posts was within a few inches of my original plan, which meant that the pergola would maintain its look and structural integrity. This is something I learned a lot during construction — hold your ideas loosely, be flexible and learn to problem solve.
Digging the post holes was difficult. At this point, we had used a pick axe and two shovels for the job (one pointy, one flat), but once we got past around 18 inches, the going was really tough. After some googling, we decided to buy a carbon steel blade post hole digger. This tool made digging so much easier. We might’ve rented an auger but Home Depot didn’t have any available. After we dug to 32 inches, we poured some gravel and placed the concrete forms. We used string lines again to check that the forms were the same height and level. The forms were cut to 42 inches long — 30 inches plus an extra foot. This meant that the concrete would stick out of the ground around 10 inches (2 would be hidden by the pavers). The reasoning here was because the longest 6x6 posts we could find for the pergola were 8 feet tall. So if we wanted the pergola “ceiling” to be at 9 feet, we needed a solution like this. I’ll build something out of some wood to conceal the concrete base eventually.
We thought that the hard work was done after we completed the holes and placed the forms, but we were wrong. A 42 inch long tube with a diameter of 12 inches is actually a fairly large volume around 2.7 cubic feet. A 60 pound bag of dry concrete makes 0.45 cubic feet of concrete. That meant we needed 6 bags per tube, or 24 bags total. That’s 1440 pounds of concrete bags that we had to carry from Home Depot! We thought that was difficult enough, but when it came time to actually make the concrete, the job stayed pretty difficult. We used one of the wheelbarrows to mix the concrete, one bag at a time, then pour it into the form. Getting all the forms filled took us a few hours. We again used string lines to ensure the tops of the forms were level to one another. Before the concrete set, we inserted post brackets that would hold the 6x6 wooden posts for the pergola. The string lines allowed us to check level. We also measured the distance between each corner, helping us ensure the brackets created a perfect square and not a rhombus.
With the concrete posts set, the next job was to start laying over 300 pavers. We used the recycled AB concrete gravel to bring up the level of the dirt, compacted it with a hand compactor, and then laid between 1 to 2 inches of concrete sand to create a level surface for the paver. This part of the whole backyard project was the lengthiest and most tedious. Most of the contractor folks that were coming through our house for various projects raised their eyebrows when we told them we were “pavering the patio ourselves” and said good luck. Each paver took anywhere from five to fifteen minutes to get right. Because the pavers were not identical to each other, a level base of sand was not enough to get the paver level on its own and in relation to its neighbors. It was a painstaking process of placing a paver, removing it, adding or removing sand, shifting sand and trying again.
I won’t go into any more boring details about the pavers, but this is the step where the patio really started taking shape and it got really exciting. When we got to laying the caps, it was clear that our dimensional math was pretty spot on. We used an angle grinder to cut the end caps to fit the corners, but other than a handful of end caps, we didn’t have to cut any pavers. The patio has a gentle slope at the end, ensuring water doesn’t pool. Some of this was by design, but also by accident. We used a reference point that turned out to be slightly higher than we expected, but the end result of the patio looks great and will handle rain storms really well. We did use polymeric sand at the end to further cement the pavers into place. Of course, it decided to rain for the first time in 10 days a few hours after we added the sand. Luckily, we had a lot of plastic wrap that we used to cover up the patio.
After the pavers came the pergola, the best part! The pergola was designed to be supported by four 6x6 inch 8 foot posts. The posts would be connected on the short side by two 11 foot 2x12 rafters, one on either side of the beams. We used a Simpson joist tie to connect the beams to the posts while adding some elegance with the black bracket. We then laid five 18 foot 2x12s across these beams, to create the pergola ceiling. We cut all the rafters to size before putting the pergola together, adding a patterned edge and staining them with two coats with a cedar stain. The light cedar stain was intended to contrast with the pressure treated and dark stained 6x6s. Putting the pergola together was fairly easy — the hardest part was simply lifting the 18 foot rafters up. I think each weighed around 80 pounds. We used a Simpson hurricane tie to connect the longer rafters to the shorter ones. To finish the pergola, we create 2x2 inch battens, around 9 feet long, out of 2x4s. Those added some stylish flair to the top of the pergola.
The last piece of the pergola was the prep table that we made. The prep table sits perpendicular to where the grill will go and is supported on one end by one of the pergola posts. The table’s just over 7 feet long. The reason we needed to build this table was to pass the permitting requirements. For some reason, in Coconino County, there is a rule that auxiliary structures on your property can be a maximum of six feet away from one of your property lines. We visited the local permitting office and the gentleman there was very helpful in helping us think through what to do, but ultimately couldn’t waive that requirement. So we expanded the pergola to reach within 6 feet of the side fence. This was all my friend’s idea! It also means that we have a very large and useful prep table, made out of 2x4s and plywood, stained to match the cedar color of the rafters.
I wish we had photos with the fire pit and outdoor furniture in place, but it rained right after we finished everything. So hopefully the next update I do will include some “patio ready” photos.
And that’s it! The next phase has a couple steps. The first is to extend the retaining wall around the outdoor kitchen area, something we thought we might be able to avoid, but ended up not being able to. We have a temporary wall in for now. I also want to build two stairs from the patio down to the rest of the yard. The goal for the yard is to build a pavered lower platform for the hot tub, and then put decorative gravel and cedar mulch everywhere else, as well as plant some more trees. Lastly, we need to remove the existing patio that came with the house and replace those pavers with the style that we used for the new patio. I have those pavers already, so it’ll just be a process of swapping them out.
Hope you enjoyed the read!
