STEPS

Years before we bought the place, the old owners turned it into a rental. There's a retaining wall in the back and between the sections of the retaining wall was a brick barbeque. One weekend so the story goes, it got trashed during a drunken party. We put in some wooden steps that lasted about twenty years. We're still diggig up old boken bricks.

This replacement uses the blocks from my old block and board bookcases. (I had a lot of them) And guess who did the lions' share of the work?  My eighty year old mother. She did most of it during the week while I was at work and it took her the better part of a month. But, she darn well did it! She filled in the patterns with sand and we'll put some of the pretty white marble chunks on top. Just plain old bark nuggets on top. There's an enclosed deck with a door at the base of the steps. Much easier to get up now than trying to get up at the end