Adding to Ambiance

[gillumhouse]

As I looked at part of my back yard a couple days I ago, I realized I have a "canopy" over a portion of my back yard. When I had planned to do elopements in my back yard, I had taken the loppers and trimmed branches on my dogwodd tree. It now, 3 years later, has formed a canopy.
Today I was shopping for k-cups at Ollie's and looked at chairs for outside. I sat in 2 kinds and bought 2 of the more comfortable of them ($20 each). Friday, I am going to go looking for a free-standing fire pit and the logs for it. IF I angle the chairs properly, one will be looking at the back wall of my house and the herbs growing there and the other will be looking at my neighbor's very pretty yard. I am going to see how these do first, then I may go back and get 2 more chairs. I do have to figure out how to keep the legs from digging into the grass. I need to find some of those thingys you put under chair legs to stop scratching the wood floors - maybe those will work.
Update: I took the chairs out of the car today - legs are flat ovals and the ground is hard there (I think it is tree roots under a thin layer of dirt), Today I got the fire pit. Here is what it looks like from each chair. Trash day will be Tuesday so that stuff by the deck will be gone.

 

[Jcam]

think they do BIG plastic disks sort of like a frisbie for this need a bigger area for soft grass in a dark green on amazon.

 

[JimBoone]

I do have to figure out how to keep the legs from digging into the grass.

Handyman solution, piece of lumber, 2x4 perhaps just slightly longer than the distance between two legs of the chair, drill a hole at each end just part way through the wood creating a socket for the chair legs.

 

[TheBeachHouse]

Great idea. One of the inns in my town lights a fire pit every night and the guests rave in the reviews. We've considered it, but we're too introverted or private or selfish, whatever it may be, to share our evenings with guests.
And where do you get $20 chairs?? Great deal!

 

[user 26]

Lovely!
Since you are penny pinching, could you look on a freecycle or craigslist or local fb page for giveaways of pavers? Make a small patio area? They sell patio tiles that go right on grass ... with little teeth. something like flat rock paver patio stones by Emsco that look like stone but are a composite. Every so often I see these things for free around here, especially when people buy a house and don't want what's there.
Yeah, I'm a total do it yourself-er. Love these kinds of projects. Someplace else I lived, a friend come over and graded the area a few inches lower so I could set pavers in a small space. Was nice. The grass poked up in a few spaces but I didn't mind, it held together well.

 

[gillumhouse]

I do have to figure out how to keep the legs from digging into the grass.

Handyman solution, piece of lumber, 2x4 perhaps just slightly longer than the distance between two legs of the chair, drill a hole at each end just part way through the wood creating a socket for the chair legs..

I do have to figure out how to keep the legs from digging into the grass.

Handyman solution, piece of lumber, 2x4 perhaps just slightly longer than the distance between two legs of the chair, drill a hole at each end just part way through the wood creating a socket for the chair legs.

Good tought. NOW I have to see if there are any drills or braces (or even bits) left in the workshop. It has been cleared of almost everything in tools. Daughter that just left took the BIG drill and circular saw. As for wood, I probably have plenty of that left behind.
Just looked, no one (including me) thought about the fact that I might need a drill or a saw. MY tool box (I was once a mechanic - tires & batteries) at a Se ars garage) was not to be touched. I have not look carefully, but I think my personal wire brush Himself made for me may have gone also. I left them to it so it is OK. I did not want anyone inhibited - there was so much there. I wonder where in the heck they are going to put everything that came out of there. At least I do not have to deal with it. Saws and small drills are not expensive.

 

[gillumhouse]

think they do BIG plastic disks sort of like a frisbie for this need a bigger area for soft grass in a dark green on amazon..

I have some pieces of carpet and a good utility scissors so I think I can cut pieces to get me through this weekend - IF it even stops raining!

 

[Morticia]

Great idea. One of the inns in my town lights a fire pit every night and the guests rave in the reviews. We've considered it, but we're too introverted or private or selfish, whatever it may be, to share our evenings with guests.
And where do you get $20 chairs?? Great deal!.

Great idea. One of the inns in my town lights a fire pit every night and the guests rave in the reviews. We've considered it, but we're too introverted or private or selfish, whatever it may be, to share our evenings with guests.
And where do you get $20 chairs?? Great deal!

Our guests hang out at the hotel next door around their fire pit. Drinks, fire, happy.
I'm like you - would not want to be entertaining all night and couldn't leave an open fire burning. We thought about running a gas line to a fire pit. We could turn it on and off from the house.
$20 and under chairs at Ace and True Value. The dark gray ones don't last. The colorful ones do. Christmas Tree also has them.

 

[gillumhouse]

Great idea. One of the inns in my town lights a fire pit every night and the guests rave in the reviews. We've considered it, but we're too introverted or private or selfish, whatever it may be, to share our evenings with guests.
And where do you get $20 chairs?? Great deal!.

Ollie's - one of those discount stores that buy the close-outs. These are the chairs they also sell as part of a patio table & chairs set, not the fold-up kind it takes a crane to pull aa person out of.

 

[gillumhouse]

Lovely!
Since you are penny pinching, could you look on a freecycle or craigslist or local fb page for giveaways of pavers? Make a small patio area? They sell patio tiles that go right on grass ... with little teeth. something like flat rock paver patio stones by Emsco that look like stone but are a composite. Every so often I see these things for free around here, especially when people buy a house and don't want what's there.
Yeah, I'm a total do it yourself-er. Love these kinds of projects. Someplace else I lived, a friend come over and graded the area a few inches lower so I could set pavers in a small space. Was nice. The grass poked up in a few spaces but I didn't mind, it held together well..

That whole area is lumpy - pavers would just break when stepped on.

 

[EmptyNest]

How about adding a little side table so folks could sit and linger around with a drink? love the firepit. Here's my very crude rendition

'

 

[gillumhouse]

How about adding a little side table so folks could sit and linger around with a drink? love the firepit. Here's my very crude rendition

'.

In the works. Have not had the first fire yet to know if THIS is going to work. It is under a dogwood tree.

 

[Whiskeyjack14]

How about adding a little side table so folks could sit and linger around with a drink? love the firepit. Here's my very crude rendition

'.

Looks cozy.

 

[JimBoone]

Lovely!
Since you are penny pinching, could you look on a freecycle or craigslist or local fb page for giveaways of pavers? Make a small patio area? They sell patio tiles that go right on grass ... with little teeth. something like flat rock paver patio stones by Emsco that look like stone but are a composite. Every so often I see these things for free around here, especially when people buy a house and don't want what's there.
Yeah, I'm a total do it yourself-er. Love these kinds of projects. Someplace else I lived, a friend come over and graded the area a few inches lower so I could set pavers in a small space. Was nice. The grass poked up in a few spaces but I didn't mind, it held together well..

That whole area is lumpy - pavers would just break when stepped on.
.

That whole area is lumpy - pavers would just break when stepped on.

If you want a defined area I offer this thought, purchase a painters plastic drop cloth (just a sheet of plastic the size you desire, place in on the grass in the area you desire, border the edges with something to weight the plastic down, football sized rocks are pretty common around our area or maybe landscape timbers and use a spike to hold them in place, fill the center (cover the plastic sheet) with mulch or crushed rock. In driveways or paths I've used what the call crush and run, a crushed rock with a certain amount of cement like dust that packs.

 

[gillumhouse]

Lovely!
Since you are penny pinching, could you look on a freecycle or craigslist or local fb page for giveaways of pavers? Make a small patio area? They sell patio tiles that go right on grass ... with little teeth. something like flat rock paver patio stones by Emsco that look like stone but are a composite. Every so often I see these things for free around here, especially when people buy a house and don't want what's there.
Yeah, I'm a total do it yourself-er. Love these kinds of projects. Someplace else I lived, a friend come over and graded the area a few inches lower so I could set pavers in a small space. Was nice. The grass poked up in a few spaces but I didn't mind, it held together well..

That whole area is lumpy - pavers would just break when stepped on.
.

That whole area is lumpy - pavers would just break when stepped on.

If you want a defined area I offer this thought, purchase a painters plastic drop cloth (just a sheet of plastic the size you desire, place in on the grass in the area you desire, border the edges with something to weight the plastic down, football sized rocks are pretty common around our area or maybe landscape timbers and use a spike to hold them in place, fill the center (cover the plastic sheet) with mulch or crushed rock. In driveways or paths I've used what the call crush and run, a crushed rock with a certain amount of cement like dust that packs.
.

thank you