‘Ourgardenw assounloved...but this has made a massive difference’
Teacher Caroline Davis (28) and electrical design engineer Jack Nedza (24) built a new covered patio area in the back garden of their Waringstown home.
They’d bought the house 18 months ago, but their beagle Milo had been racing up and down the garden, destroying the plants on one side, so they decided to replace that area with a paved patio. They also wanted to replace the paving slabs in the middle of the garden with turf, which they took from the new patio area, creating a continuous stretch of lawn.
“It was really tatty looking — the slabs were all overgrown and it was looking a bit unloved, but this has made a massive difference. We’re very proud of it,” Caroline says.
“We got engaged in February. We bought the house a year and a half ago and we’d always wanted to do up the garden, but we didn’t have the money because we were doing the inside.
“We knew we were going to have to save for our honeymoon, so we just decided to do it ourselves as Jack had the time off.
“I am a teacher so I’m doing remote learning, but I had time in the afternoons and weekends and Jack carried on when I was working.”
The first step was to remove the old slabs from the centre of the garden and then they marked out a 9x3m patio area and dug it out by hand.
“We basically dug for about a week as no diggers could get up the side of the house, so we did it all ourselves. The builders’ merchants told us we were mad and it would never work!” Caroline says.
“We got it level first and then Jack had to dig down 10 inches for the posts to go in. There was one day when it was scorching and I got a bit burnt, but whether it was raining or whatever, we still got out and did it.
“In between all this, we had two tonnes of stones delivered and over three days I was digging stones from the front drive and wheelbarrowing them to the back while Jack was putting the posts in.
“Then we had to use a whacker to hit all the stones down and make it all compact.”
The couple hired this from the builders merchants who were able to deliver it, followed by a cement mixer at a later stage. Caroline found herself mixing cement in the front drive and ferrying it to the back for Jack to lay the slabs.
“I didn’t need to work out for a couple of weeks!” she laughs.
“Jack went back to work three weeks ago and I did the grouting between all the slabs. And the first weekend after he was back, Jack finished the structure. The last bit is putting the roof on — that’s due to be delivered. We managed to buy some swing chairs and it looks fantastic, to be honest. We got two Bushmills whiskey barrels and some stools to create a seating area round the barbecue and we have some outdoor furniture last year that we’d bought last year and never used.”
Caroline pays tribute to her granny, who pushed them to undertake the project: “She’s the one with the green thumbs in our family!”
She’s now looking forward to having friends round and having a barbecue once the roof is on and the restrictions are over.
“Throughout last summer we didn’t have anywhere to sit outside. We sat on top of the step outside,” she says.
“We’d spent so much money inside the house, but it’s nice to have somewhere for family and friends to be able to sit and socialise.
“Jack did a super job — I just did a bit of hard graft. He laid the slabs, he made the whole structure himself but I just mixed the cement and did a lot of digging.”
Estimated cost:
about £1,750— on building materials, equipment rental (whacker plate and cement mixer), furniture and lighting.
Time it took:
about 80 hours. We would spend around eight hours in the garden at weekends, whether the sun was shining or it was raining.
Best bargain: Bushmills whiskey barrels, which we found through a Facebook Marketplace link. They were £40 and delivered for free. The best thing is there is still a bit of whisky in them!
The advice I’d pass on: Make sure you do your research. Once you’ve researched you just need to get it started or else it won’t happen. Jack also made sure all of his measurements were correct at each phase of the build to ensure minimal mistakes throughout.