Chip sealing

Nearly approachable

Currently, completion is slated for this week!

Concrete results

First of two loads of cement

Mesmerizing watching these guys work hard and fast against the clock

Went with concrete for the bend in our driveway to better handle the upcoming years of UPS and other heavy vehicles

He's doing the "jitterbug"! No, serious, that's what it's called: jitterbugging.

I attempted to add a few Loki paw prints for character, but they were quietly and quickly brushed away by the concrete guru (can't blame the guy; I'm the same with any of my work)

Second load arriving

Perfection, unless the deer have a party on it before fully setting

Last phase, which is due for completion this week: asphalt

Clean car, clean dog

Before, washing my car meant a dirty dog because loves make mud with the runoff. Now, clean car, clean dog! I'm in love with my new paving stones!

Paver progress—part IV

Borders completed!

Sand will fill the gaps to help lock the bricks together.

A large roller will come through after the sand to compress everything into place.

Paver progress—part III

Ten more pallets arrived, and two hard-working guys threw down half of them in a day!

Loki posing

Last of the (whole) paving stones are down!

Border work is all that's needed for the upper parking area.

For the curious, the paving stones were made to order by Calstone: http://calstone.com/. The hard-working folks putting them down, DMS Construction: http://scdmsconstruction.com/

Civilized drive

Now that the retaining walls are in, I finally got to rip down my hastily orange painted street sign, and replace it with a spiffy new reflective one.

After the paver stones are laid, asphalt will stretch from the parking area to the local road. Dust will finally be defeated!

Paver progress—part II

Ten pallets of paver stones down!

The next 10 pallets arrive tomorrow.

And there's another 10 pallets after those...

Paving progress pictures

Retaining wall post being set where our driveway meets the road

I'll have to measure, but there more than 200 feet of wall to keep the landslide tide back

The parking area is being graded for water drainage

I'm told we are paving approximately 2800 square feet of hillside

Using gravel along the borders, and will likely be adding retaining walls up the hillside to reduce erosion, and increase our landscaping and garden areas

Soon I can wash my car without the dog turning himself into a mud ball

Paver stones, which were baked to order for our site, arriving pallet after pallet

They're cutting several of the stones so that they can lay the pavers like cobblestone

Pavers the way

Work has started on our driveway!

When we found our hillside hut, there wasn't even clearance enough for a small car to make it up the driveway (archive: First Projects).

I can already visualize the finalized project, but I'm guessing it will be three times as good looking in reality. Work includes:

• widening the driveway to 11 feet so that the fire department will finally (in the entire history of the house) grant approval and permit for habitability. Strange, I know, but I'm told by the county that it was never acquired, not that it really matters to them. But it will lower our insurance premium.
• adding more than 200 feet of retaining walls. Neighbors told us the previous owners would park in the turnouts below the house because they feared a landslide trapping them in during the rainy seasons. A bit extreme, but not unwarranted considering the driveway's condition.
• grading the entire parking area and driveway and adding drainage for optimum water redirection and management.
• repairing and repaving the 1/10 mile driveway with asphalt.
• installing up to 2,800 sq. ft. of paver stones for the parking area, which I'm told last longer, require less maintenance, environmentally sound drainage, and even allow access to our utility lines buried underneath without major issues.