Better Start Digging

 Well now that I have the plan laid out for this sidewalk, I need to finish the dry fit, be sure I've got enough pavers to do what I want to do there, and start grading down for a 4" pour. Also, when I started digging, my wife had got some good ideas. And it's important to listen to your wife, because she only has good ideas, right? right?? These actually turned out to be amazing ideas. I wanted to add some drainage below the rain chains, so I need to set those drain lines before pouring the concrete. She wanted to add on a couple of exterior outlets and some low voltage landscape lighting. I found where we could run a power line out through the downstairs bedroom wall, then ran low voltage from there. She wanted outlets on each side of the stairs to be able to plug in Christmas lights that she puts out on the knee walls, so I added a switch for those as well. And we got another continuous outlet on the inside of the front porch as well! The electrical is the sizzle on this steak, but you have to plan and bury that conduit first, before pouring concrete. 

First drainage ditch

Starting to form the front feature

Grading the curved feature

Starting the other drainage ditch

Putting conduit across the front of the stairs. This will be buried in concrete

New raised bed gets a switched outlet and conduit to the inside of the porch

Left of the stairs gets a switched outlet and the switch

That's the switch

It's a long run to the wall mount

One sweaty electrician!

Concrete - wishful thinking

Buried and wired up

(not the actual feed wire - turned out dead)

Conduit for low voltage

The other conduit for low voltage

First drain is going in! Some perforated for capturing gutter runoff, some perforated for the leech field

The other drain line, now with more gravel

I covered the perforated drain line with some leftover roofing felt I had in the shed, and it's in a gravel base. This should keep the dirt out and let the water disperse. The drain line gets covered both with concrete and dirt. The rain chains will shed water into a box that these lines are connected with, and the water should leech out. After some testing (read: rainstorms before I got it covered) I had to add a longer drain line to the left side. This one in the last picture is always fine. This helps keep water running away from the house even as I reduce the amount of permeable surface. 

Up next, more electrical! and concrete.