Expect the Unexpected

Saturday was an aggravating day because it rained and ruined some of my plans. It wasn't just a light pleasant rain. It was a oh-shit-seal-up-the-windows-before-the-house-floods type if rain. So, I went to work finishing up some of the interior work I have been putting off. I painted the back of the front door and put another coat of varnish on the front (I'll put pictures when it is all done). I also painted the exterior of the fireplace because it was all scraped up. That didn't go so well and I will have to do it again soon.

A few more little projects later, and we were having a great dinner with our friends Matt & Michelle on our back deck. We were talking about our projects and how we were going to start on the backyard the following day. I finished by saying "want to come over", and to my surprise, they actually did. But, they had plans. Sure they did.

Sunday morning I woke up at the crack of dawn, and headed out to Home Depot to pick up some new plants for the front yard and to get a sledgehammer to start the planter demolition. I opted for the 8lb sledgehammer since I couldn't swing the other ones with ease (you can now mentally picture me swinging sledgehammers in the store). Once I came back I started to smash a couple of the bricks and realized it was going to be a back-breaking task. Little did I know what was to come. Dan soon came out to help and we proceeded to take down about 1/5 of the planter in an hour. We were getting into a funk about the project and how long it was going to take. It was like swinging an 8lb bat into a 6lb baseball that did not move and then picking up the 6lb baseball and throwing it three feet. My back and arms started to get shaky after about 30 minutes of that. It also didn't help that a bird shit on my neck and in my hair. Disgusting! Just when we were settling on the idea that we would not take the whole thing down in one day, Matt & Michelle pulled up. Taaa-daaa!!!! They ditched their plans to smash some bricks. It was our saving grace and we couldn't have been more pleased. Two hours later the planter was pretty much down and we soon realized the bricks went about four layers into the ground. This posed a problem. To dig them out and try to smash them was really hard, so we still have more work to do. Although we worked almost the entire day yesterday, it wasn't enough to get it all done. My jello arms also could barely pick up a brick in the end.

My tetanus shot came in handy when I scraped my shin on a rusted wire basket we pulled from the planter. Thanks Dr. Davis! I also ended up with about 10 welts on my legs from hitting myself with the sledgehammer, shovel or bricks. Oh, and although I put sunscreen on my arms and shoulders, I completely forgot about the back of my neck and arms. Sunburn city here I come! So, once again, I am a mess. At the end of the day I showered and put on shorts that Dan quickly called my "I-give-up-shorts", which reinforced that I did not look my best. My mind was also heavy with the fact we had a gigantic pile of rubble in the back and no place to put it.

Anyway, here are some pictures of what it looks like now:
I am not sure if these pictures capture the magnitude of this brick pile - but it is scary. Thankfully I ordered a dumpster and they are bringing it by today!