DIY Brick Patio

Today I wanted to share photos of our new brick patio and explain how we made it: The Cheap Way!

 

So, we have this plot of ground that is about 5' x 10' that we used as a garden (which was a major fail) but now is currently under management of the weeds. This is the only picture I have where you can see the area I am referring to. This was taken when we first moved in. Behind the poisonous-to-dogs-tree (since removed) you can see the future home of our new brick patio.

Anyways, I searched Craigslist and our local ads for free bricks for many months. I would get all excited only to end up finding them gone by the time I had gotten there or in bad shape. I had managed to snag maybe 30-40 bricks total that were in good shape.

After doing this for a year, I figured we had waited long enough. Mendards had a great sale on bricks (25cents each) so we stocked up and also got a few 12x12 pavers to spread out amongst the old and new bricks. This is what the mix of pavers, new bricks and old bricks look like:

So, we (meaning Steve) gathered all the bricks and then dug out a little bit of the dirt that was there but really he just pounded the dirt down (with a mallet or brick) and laid weed control fabric down first before laying the bricks down in a random order. Not too random though, because we didn't want all the old bricks on one side and all the new bricks on the other- so he tried to stagger them.

After pounding and laying them down, I helped him this past weekend to add in the sand. It was kind of relaxing- pouring in sand and sweeping it into the cracks. Note: buy the proper sand- I hear that not all sands are created equal. We bought whatever the Lowes guy told us to.

Another thing- not all bricks are created equal! He figured this out after realizing that the free bricks I had gathered were much taller than the cheap bricks we had bought.  To compensate for different heights, he removed the shorties one at a time and put extra sand underneath them. This is not the correct way to do it- but hey, this is the cheap (and resourceful) way to do it!

Here's what it looks like right now:

We put the grill back there for fun but we really are hoping to have a vegetable container garden- can't you see it? We will also remove the dead vines... soon... and the extra landscaping pavers we have sitting on the back slab. And yes, if it looks like some of the bricks against the garage are not flat- it's because we haven't completely finished pounding them in, but they will soon be all flush.

I know that not everyone can enjoy an imperfect patio, but I sure can and I am thrilled we no longer be overrun with weeds! And for some reason, Copper and Calvie (the cat) like it too.
Total cost = $102.75
Sand: $29.99
Weed-free Fabric: $10.00 (on sale)
Bricks: some free (about 50 and a few pavers)
The rest of the bricks: $62.76 (this was 210 bricks @ $.25 ea and 5 pavers @ $.99ea)