Week 24: Phase 4 and 5. First half of week.

 Monday The slabs are down and the grout stuff has been ordered "Azpects Easy Joint". Found it left outside the front door as we'd been out all day on Tuesday. Thankfully no-one nicked it.

A bit of Yoga and some exercise on the not quite completed patio this morning. The grouting has yet to be done, the walls painted and some snagging jobs. The lights need to be put up and a Canvas 'Sail' or two to create some shade. 

This is the garden at the start or day. The objective today was to start replacing the concrete slabs on the steps with the sandstone ones. I knew this was going to be tricky because of the fact that we'd need to do the steps alternately as we wouldn't be able to stand on the ones completed for another 24 hours, so it's a bit awkward.

These are the old concrete slabs that have been in place whilst we've working. We're up and down all day long with dirty boots and shoes, so if the sandstone slates would have been fitted already they'd be a mess. These slabs are just positioned with no mortar. 

above. The process. Before laying any mortar, the top of the gabion was filled with smaller pebbles, rocks and shingle. This created a level for when the 4:1 mortar was laid (Plus feb mix). The idea is that the mortar will bind with the stones, cobbles and the gabion wire to create a strong bond? Before being placed on top, the under side of the sandstone was treated with priming slurry. 

Initially I was concerned that the mortar might ooze through into the big cobbles that are visible at the front of the gabions, so in the first step I places a strip or Terram 1000 to help prevent that from happening. 

Above is how it looked with the mortar added. The slab was then laid on top and bashed into place and levelled using a rubber mallet and a spirit level to check the levels. 

Having the new slabs in place with their mortar drying as you try and work on the next one was awkward. The situation was then worsened as we took away the concrete slabs as these were all cut to approximate sizes and just laid on top of the gabions. This meant now working the sandstone slabs to more precise measurements -  30cm deep we had to make adjustments to the gabion positions. This was problematic as we hadn't prepped efficiently e.g. the slabs going in also needed to be cut to custom sizes and we  had a load of mortar and priming slurry ready to go. We managed to get these 4 in and the rest of the day and evening was spent getting ready for tomorrow having learned from our mistakes. Having said that if we make a start on the laying early, the mortar might still be compromised. So what we might do is all the prepping first - Custom cuts, wiring and strengthening the gabions, filling the tops of the gabions and any cavities. I might also do the grouting/jointing as the stuff is ready to go...

Last shot of the day with some moving around. The garden is gradually getting tidier and tidier and hopefully significantly so over the coming 4 or 5 days.