See that? That's the new view from my patio lounger and I'm pretty darn excited about it. I already told you about the saga that was post-hole digging, and hanging the fence panels was supposed to be the easy part. Emphasis on "supposed to".
Adam's friend - and bandmate - came over on Sunday morning to help us hang the panels while my mom looked after Hannah. Two of the panels went up easy, then things got complicated (spoiler alert: the fence still isn't finished). Two of the posts were just a smidge too close together, which meant that we needed to trim the panel with a circular saw (and that meant we needed to buy a circular saw). We measured - and re-measured - when we set our posts, but it turns out that two of the panels were a tiny bit wider than the others. We only measured one panel when we set the posts, but in retrospect, we should have measured all of them. Luckily it was a relatively easy - and nearly imperceptible - fix.
But don't worry, it gets better.
It turns out the last two posts were way too far apart. We've talked a lot about what went wrong - we were so careful about our measurements! - and the only thing we can think of is that we should have written our measurements down. We kept mixing up the width of the panels, so my guess is that we had the wrong number in mind when setting this post. Very frustrating, but ultimately a good reminder to always WRITE THINGS DOWN and REFERENCE THEM.
Since there was no way we were going to rip out the post and re-do it (hello, two feet of concrete), we decided to attach 1x2s to the inside of each post and secure the panel to those. Our plan is to ultimately paint or stain the fence - dark - which will hopefully make our error less noticeable.
Onto setback #3 (you read that right). All of the how-tos I consulted said to trim the tops of the posts using a circular saw. The ground on the other side of our fence drops off pretty dramatically, which means there isn't any room for a ladder. And since trimming the post required cutting into it from each side, Adam didn't feel safe cutting towards himself. He actually cut one post this way and decided to stop. Our plan is to borrow his brother's reciprocating saw - hopefully this weekend - so we can finish trimming and capping the posts.
Obviously we still have some landscaping to do, too. We're planning to add a few inches of soil along the length of the fence - both to build up the ground in places and to hide the concrete - and I'm on the hunt for a good shade-loving border plant. And yes, there's the whole patchy grass situation to deal with.
With the addition of the fence, I feel like we have too many different tones of wood going on. I already mentioned that we want to use a dark stain or paint on the fence, and I think some pillows, potted plants and flowers will go a long way back here. The leaves on the trees are just starting to fill in, and the same is true of our little 'bamboo grove' in the background. Which is all to say: it only gets better from here.
Despite the setbacks, the fence is so, so awesome. The patio feels more like a 'room' now, if that makes sense. We had some family over for dinner that night and it was so great to be able to eat on the patio without staring at our neighbour's parking area. Yay, progress!
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