It’s been quiet around here and for good reason, a couple of weeks ago Mike and I jet set across the Atlantic for 9 days in Central Europe!  I’ve been busy editing and reminiscing about our trip and am now ready to share all the details. 

We talked about planning a trip to Europe this year for almost an entire year.  I left the actual countries we would visit up to Mike since I’ve been across the pond a couple times.  He couldn’t make up his mind, so one day perusing Groupon, of all places, I came across a Central Europe group tour package that included Prague, Munich, Salzburg and Vienna.  It also mentioned a stop in Pilsen for a brewery tour, so I knew it sounded like something Mike would enjoy!

The Groupon offered was through Gate 1 Travel, and included our flights, hotels, transportation, and pretty much breakfast and dinner every day.  After my recaps I’ll devote a post to these parts of the trip for reference and to share our group tour experience (something we were a little apprehensive about at the beginning, not going to lie).  But until then, here’s our trip through each city/region:

We started our trip in Czech Republic in Prague.

Of all the places we visited, this was both of our favorite.  The city was beautiful, easy to get around – mostly by foot, and the people were all very nice.  Prague “City of a Hundred Spires” is the capital of Czech Republic and the historical capital of Bohemia.  It’s situated along the Vltava river and is the 15th largest city in the European Union. 

There hasn’t been any progress on the actual porch as we’re waiting for a lost shipment of materials to arrive.  But, we do have progress!

Our walkway was poured!

You’ll remember that we tore out the walkway, almost 5 years ago, that went to the street because we knew we would rather have something from the driveway.  I then designed something curvy and Mike dug out the grass. 

After the grass was removed, Mike formed up the actual walkway.

The walkway is 3 feet wide, and then fans out a little wider as it turns to the porch for a pad for the future precast stairs (which have been ordered and should be installed next week).

We had planned for a Saturday morning pour, but with the threat of rain, Mike called it Friday afternoon and scheduled the truck for delivery at 5:00pm Friday evening.   

We actually went in with our neighbor because he wanted to widen his driveway for a basketball hoop. I hung around waiting to see if I would be needed, (and I love watching concrete work being done!) and snapped some photos of his project.

Mike was schooled on how to drive the buggy like 5 minutes before he had to hop on and get to work. 

I snapped some pictures to show how great he was doing, and literally 5 minutes later this happened!

The concrete was very wet and poured out of the buggy so fast!  Luckily, our project was next and it didn’t require the buggy.

Mike just poured right into the wheelbarrow and wheeled it over. 

And, it was around this time I had to go inside to get ready for dinner plans I had with some of my girlfriends.  I might have felt a little bad, but this being a last minute pour so they were on their own!  The truck driver actually helped Mike considerably, and when the guys were done across the street, they came over too to help finish.   These were taken on Monday after the forms were pulled and sealer was applied.

For those that aren’t aware of concrete delivery, there’s a small load charge for anything under a certain yardage, and a weekend charge can be added too.  Since we switched to Friday we didn’t have to incur the weekend charge, but knowing our projects weren’t that big, Mike worried that we might get hit with a small load charge.  So, what do you think he did?  Found more concrete to pour! 

There were two sections of our sidewalk that got cracked when the dirt was delivered during the garage/backyard project.  So, Mike tore that out and poured a new section.

I’m so glad we’ve got a walkway now, but I’m itching for stairs, and our materials to get here so that we can have a normal looking house again!

But that also means I’ll have to get out there and transplant all the plants back to that area and mulch, so maybe I don’t mind waiting for a little bit longer!

While the ladies were brunching and celebrating my sister’s bridal shower this past weekend, Mike was busy working on the porch.

In the last update, Mike had begun stabilizing the porch. 

Over the weekend he finished stabilizing it, and began the framework for putting it back together!

You’ll also notice he killed all my hostas and boxwoods.  Just kidding, but that’s kind of what I thought when I came back from the bridal shower!  He moved them all to the side yard (something he tried to make me do, and I continually told him it would be fine to just work around – whoops!). 

He not only replaced the boards that had termite damage, he reinforced areas that weren’t properly supported, as well as beefed up the supports under the columns.  He also added some girders underneath for even more support.  This porch is going to outlast the house! 

He then added OSB as the base for the siding that we’re re-attaching. 

Monday, he had river stone delivered (the same stuff we’ve used on the side and behind the garage) and used it around the posts to act as a barrier between the dirt and building materials.  All the new wood added was all pressure-treated as well. 

Mike also outlined the new walkway and plant bed and removed the topsoil and started grading.  We’ll reuse the topsoil in the bed as well as fill in some low spots in the yard.  One of them being right where Mike threw all the topsoil.

This was very exciting because we are now able to see the path of the walkway and envision things in relation to it.  It’s been mostly abstract up until now, with phrases like “I want it to be winding” being thrown out when talking about ideas.

This week we plan to get some materials and layout the walkway for pouring concrete.  We’ve also ordered some of the material for the porch and hope to have that wrapped up in the next couple of weeks!  Our Annual Crawfish Boil is June 27th, so that’s our unofficial goal for getting as much of this project done, we’ll see!