Spring Break! Woo!!

We were given a gift this week.  Wonderful, fantastic, magnificent weather.  Our original plan was to settle on a master bedroom color, paint and start decorating the room.  Instead we knocked down an exterior fence, dug up some 30 year old railroad ties and built a new retaining wall.  Whew.

Here is the story in pictures:

What it looked like last fall

Contemplation.

This whole project was spearheaded by the kids' refusal
*cough William cough*
to eat a yummy pizza that we had ordered for Spring Break!  Woo!! dinner.

John was a little cheesed off, so he went outside and kicked the fence down.

I kid.

He really wasn't that mad.  But it took less than a minute (48 seconds) to kick the fence down.

Apparently they didn't pour concrete foundations for the posts.

Our lucky day I suppose....

Phase one.  Which was all we were going to do this spring.

We decided to build a new! improved!! retaining wall and take up the
30 year old railroad ties which were rotting away anyway.

We weren't going to round the corner this spring,
we thought we could livewith it this summer and possibly do it this fall.

But then the weather was perfect for outdoor projects, so...

... we rounded the corner and decided to knock this section out as well.  

Not even kidding, this photo is nearly the exact angle as the one above.
That's what the wall above looked like this last fall

Here is a closeup of the rotting railroad ties.  The rot
did not make them any easier to remove.

Not. One. Bit.

Only 2 more levels of railroad ties to go!!

Now, I'll skip to the good part.  Because how many pictures of John, Sam or I swinging various implements (sledgehammers, chainsaws and axes OH MY!!) to hack away at some railroad ties can you look at?  Seriously, those were AWFUL.  I suppose they were properly installed with 3 foot long spikes holding them steady.  But so many of them were rotted with weeds growing through them we just bit the bullet and moved forward.  

But seriously, it sucked removing them.  I can not stress enough how bad it sucked.  Trust me, it did.

Moving on...

Yay!! Almost done :)

And now, the big reveal...

BEFORE

Seriously.  This is the same spot.  Seriously.

AFTER

Ahh.  All done :)

We can't plant anything for another 5 or 6 weeks, but OMG it's awesome.

No more weeds or rotten railroad ties.

And another angle..

 BEFORE

annnnnddddd....

AFTER!!!

Here is the view from the deck.
The veg garden goes on the left, and cutting garden goes on the right.

We are thinking about building a nice fence to give us some privacy back there,
but will definitely not get to that anytime soon.

We're tired.  And happy.

So there you have Retaining Wall Adventures 2012.  The first installment.