A Water Snafu

As you know, we have been SLOWLY working on creating a patio behind our house off downstairs slider. Today my dad came over and was prepared to help Cort start framing off our patio preparing it for concrete. They ran into a slight snafu...standing water. Remember all that rain we've had in the past week? Apparently we now have quicksand in our backyard. If we went ahead and let it dry and put concrete over it, eventually the clay under the patio would still collect water, it would freeze in the winter, and we would have a cracked patio on our hands. Not so wonderful.

As a solution, my dad found out about tiling--basically putting a big tube under the concrete that has lots of holes in it to soak up the excess water. This tube is connected to a series of more tubes that drains the water out past our yard into the woods. The tubing was cheap, but it did mean a bunch more work. While Cort went to Lowes for tubing, my dad dug the whole trench. Yeah, he's a machine. There he is taking a Sprite break on our deck. Hey dad!Once dad had the trench dug, they put the tubes in it and Cort worked on filling it all back in. Now he just has to make the lawn pretty again. Oh, and wait for the water to dry up in the patio area so he can bury the tiling tube.
Yup, we are watching water dry here at our house. Seeing as it took about a month for the melted snow to dry up back there, I am not holding my breath for the patio to be done by our party in two weeks...but you never know! If we get some nice, dry days, you all may be sitting on the finished patio after all. Otherwise you will be keeping the small children out of the quicksand. Either way, it will be entertaining!