There comes a time in your life when you stop for a moment to take a breathe...and that breathe takes too long and you just stop. You stop moving forward. You look around at the landscape of your life and maybe really see it for the first time, like climbing a peak and then finally realizing the vista you have around you. The best part, or maybe the scariest, is when you turn around and look down the road you've traveled. Well, not just look, but examine closely. Your eyes scan the road to events, people, places, memories..the road. You remember that one summer with a friend that you'd long forgotten. A memory of how you felt standing in front of your locker in the seventh grade with all your friends around. The feeling you got when you held a certain girls hand. The smell of the popcorn and the sounds of announcers on loudspeakers and all the laughter and voices at the state fair. The exhilaration of cheering your high school football team to victory. What was I thinking way back then? What did I feel? Is this the right road? Reading through signatures in a yearbook brings warm feelings to me. I remember me, who I used to be. The smiles, the laughter, the jokes, the friends. I certainly miss the friends. It's so easy to lose track of people. The mortgage and groceries become more important. It's a sad state of affairs. How did I lose it? Was it marriage? ..or the first kid? ..or the first house? ..or the first "real" job? There's no telling when it happened. To those still on that road, the road that's still young, take the time to enjoy the people around you. None of the memories matter without the people. I miss so many of them now..or rather maybe I just miss those seemingly effortless friendships we all shared without the burdens that now weigh me down.

Make Your Own Stamped Concrete Patio

Have you ever wanted a patio that looks like real flagstone without the incredible cost of real flagstone? It's possible to save money and do it yourself, if you're not afraid of hard work. When we purchased our house, there was no deck or patio outside our sliding glass door. Of course, we wanted a nice place to hang out, have barbecues, and enjoy the great outdoors...on a lounge chair with a cold drink. I didn't like the cost and size of the concrete patios in our area, and I wanted something different than the usual wooden deck. I settled on stamped concrete. After looking at the costs, I settled on DIY stamped concrete. After some searching, I was able to find all the tools online. The following is a list of the specialty items required:

Concrete Stamp	Release Agent	Concrete Mixer
Nylon Fiber	Tamper	Pressure Washer

You'll also need some regular tools, like a hammer, trowel, timer (to time the concrete mix), etc. I won't go into the details of how to layout the patio, create a footer, and other essentials, as DIY instructions can be easily found on countless sites on the internet.

Since I wanted to do this project completely DIY, I decided to find a way to mix and pour all the concrete myself, allowing for me to do the project over a longer period of time and stamp it as I go. Most concrete patios are 4-6" thick. That's a lot of concrete to mix for a 600sq.ft. patio! I decided to go with a 12" base of gravel and use a layer of 2" fiber-reinforced concrete. This has turned out to be an excellent choice. I dug down 12" and created a base of stone that was compacted in three separate lifts of 4" each. This created a very firm base. My concrete mix consisted of a 3:2:1 mixture of sand, gravel, and portland cement. I added a handful of nylon fibers to each batch of concrete. The nylon fibers have worked wonders for fiber-reinforcement. The patio has withstood 4 winters and there's still no cracking!

The process of stamping is as follows:

Pour concrete, level it, and wait for water sheen to evaporate or be absorbed
Throw on release agent
Place mat on concrete and tamp it to make impression
Move mat and repeat tamping
Wait 24 hours and pressure wash the concrete to remove excess release agent

The key to the entire process is patience. You have to be patient to make sure the concrete is still pliable, but not soaking wet. You have to be patient when placing the mat to make sure the seams line up. You have to be patient and wait for the concrete surface to dry before you pressure wash it. Most of all, you have to be patient because it's a long, hard job. The rewards, however, are worth it. When I get a chance, I'll take some pics of our finished patio...oh, yeah, that's after I finish it. The concrete's finished, and most of the landscape is done, but I still need to put up a couple sections of privacy fence, clean up the pour lines with a concrete saw, seal the concrete, and finish the landscaping. For now, though, I'm working on replacing carpeting with resilient vinyl plank flooring. Hmm...oughta take some pics for my next blog detailing another partially completed project.

Larger Recycling Bins from Waste Management

We're kind of a large family (6) and we feel we should do our part and recycle. We regularly fill up 6+ 20 gallon totes with recycling every two weeks. Our local council has made an agreement with Waste Management to provide each house in our community with a large recycling bin on wheels. Hopefully, this will get more people involved with recycling. However, there are some things to consider when recycling, because not everything is recyclable and some items require an extra step or two. Waste Management has put together an excellent site that details what is and is not recyclable called Think Green. Recycling is a very simple thing we can all do to make a difference.