[Today’s run: 7 miles]
For two years we have been thinking about building a shade structure over our back patio. Our back door faces mostly south, and the summer sun really beats in. So we want to build a pergola-type structure and maybe grow some wisteria on it or other vine, to provide shade.
A while ago I built a column from bricks left over from the house.
Today we worked on the second column, this time using bagged concrete mix and one of those tube-form things.
We laid the thing out earlier this week. I dug the hole yesterday. The digging was easy because it was 100% sand under the sod. I had a beautiful hole. Then we received 3/4″ of rain and the sides of my hole slumped a bit at the bottom.
Today I cleaned out the hole and set the form so that the top was about one foot above the grass. We mixed and placed 6 80-lb bags of concrete. (I was worried toward the end if we would have enough. Finished with a couple of scoops left.) We put a ‘J-bolt’ in the middle, to use with a post fitting.
We put some plastic-wrap stuff over the top to keep the moisture in.
I think it looks pretty good! One more large hole to do. And we have to resolve a place where the post will come down on the existing slab.