Mulch and Full

We are officially 1 day away from startup, and with 100F weather, it's not a day too soon! Today we finished filling the pool, and had some rough landscaping put in. The kids and I have been prepping flower beds a little this week, so it's neat to see mulch and sod in place.

Here are a few pictures that capture the water color (although it's a little lighter in person), and basic layout of the flower beds...

Still Filling

After about 17 hrs of filling with 2 hoses and a direct PVC line, we are about 2/3 of the way full. At this rate, we should be full around lunch time, and estimate a 20,000 gallon capacity.

Here are a few pictures showing what it looks like so far. We're very happy with the plaster color, and are glad we didn't go darker!

Water

After almost 6 weeks of construction, we finally have a pool! They acid washed the plaster today, and started filling it up, so everyone is pretty excited. It looks like startup will be Friday, so they beat the schedule by 2 weeks!

Here are a few pictures of the pool filling up:

Plaster

We are officially one day away from water!

Today the plaster crew was at the house around 6:45, and even though that meant the kids were up a little early, we are excited to be 99% finished with our pool! Tomorrow they will return to acid wash the cement off, which should result in a more blue surface, but it already looks great.

This image is of one of the benches, which came out smooth, and shows a little bit of the color, which will be bluer and darker once it's acid washed and water is added:

Here's a closeup for the beach entry, which still requires some finish work, but is a pretty decent shot of the pebbles:

This evening Josh, Gavin and I put down some landscaping fabric, raked some of the rocks out of Harley's dog run, and started borders for the flower beds, so we're anxious to get things wrapped up this week!

Fenced In

Over the weekend Josh and I set-up the play set including a weed block, and today the sprinkler guys came, so we're ready for mulch and sod!

We also hired Keller Fence Co. to put up a wrought iron rail around our existing porch, and add a dog run for Harley. They are doing a nice job, and should paint tomorrow to improve the appearance of everything:

As with everything, we noticed a few things that would improve the functionality of the project, so we added a couple extra gates, but that meant the cost of the fence increased a little. It should be a lot nicer for family gatherings though, and with a pool lock, it will make us feel a little better about Gavin on the back porch (when we're out there):

Tomorrow we're supposed to have the plaster installed, so we're only a few days from having water!

House Moving

Even though Robertson Pools has done an amazing job with our pool, I was disappointed to hear this week they weren't able to budge the playhouse! Really, it's tough to be too upset about it, but if Grandpa wasn't so capable with moving heavy equipment, this would have been a real pain (we think it weighs about 1,500 lb).

Here's where the house was after the re-grade last week:

We ended up having to borrow some pipe from the fence guys, and bought six landscaping timbers to make a rail system for the house to ride on. Then it was just a matter of winching the house up to the dirt pad. Here's a picture of the house on the dirt pad still sitting on the pipe:

Finally, after about 5 weeks of sitting back by the fence, the playhouse is where we planned it!

Much thanks to Grandpa for making this happen!

Regrade

Today the clean up crew came through and restored our yard back to something semi respectable. Since the pool and deck make it impossible to get a bobcat back there, they had to do all this work by hand, but it looks 100% better.

Here's a shot Josh took from inside the pool:




The retaining walls have been backfilled, and are ready for sprinklers:







They still have to move the playhouse, but there's a nice level pad for it:




Overall, everything is really starting to come together:




All that's left is...

??? - Moving the playhouse
Thurs/Mon - Porch railing, dog run, and pool gates
Mon - Sprinklers
Tues - Plaster
Thurs - Startup
Fathers Day - Swimming

Rockwork is Done

Today the stone guys spent half the day finishing up, and even fixed the flower bed in the front yard! It's pretty neat to see things so close to being done, and this Tuesday they are supposed to regrade and clean-up, so that should be a huge milestone.

Here is the finished spillway in the spa:




The flagstone steps are also in place:




The larger retaining wall takes up a lot of space, which is great (less to mow):




Here's a view looking back towards the house, which looks 100x better than the mud pit we had 1 mo ago:




We're hopeful to be sod ready by the end of the week, with the final plaster put in around the 14th!

Location:Saratoga Downs Ct,Fort Worth,United States

Retaining Walls - Day 2.5

The retaining walls are progressing slowly but surely. They look great, so this is one of those things we're not interested in rushing! Flagstone steps haven't been put in place yet, but the different retaining wall heights are visible now (18" at the porch down to 6" at the deck edges).

The first picture below shows what the walls looked like this morning (before the second and 3rd rows were added at the top):

This afternoon the wall really looks a lot more complete. They still need to finish off the back rows and the top, but the general heights are basically set:

Looking back from the other side of the pool, you can see how both retaining walls will come together at the back porch:

Last weekend the kids and I spent some time re-staining the play house as well, so here's a picture of what it looks like. The house is supposed to be shifted over towards the center of the pool, but at about 1,500 lb, it will be interesting to see how they accomplish this!

Retaining Walls - Finally

Todays update is pretty minor, but since it's been nearly a week since we've posted (or had an update on the pool), we wanted to show our current progress. The stone guys showed up again today, and fortunately it is the same crew that did the great work on the spa. They are continuing with the dry stack appearance, which we're very happy to see, since they could have chosen a simple milsap wall. One of the nice things about Robertson Pools is they haven't upcharged us for any options that a lot of builders would (stones, DE filter, etc.), and we got enough quotes to verify that this wasn't just an advertising ploy. I think the way they are able to offer great quality without a lot of additional cost is the fact that their trades are in house, but we also haggled quite a bit on the upfront price to get it reduced down by $6,000.

So, enough rambling, and on to the pictures showing today's progress. They have 66' of 18-6" retaining walls and 31' of flagstone steps to install, so it sounds like they will be onsite for about 3 days. The challenge with this work is the crew has to hand cut each stone to minimize the gaps, so here is the first row they've completed on one of the retaining walls:

Since the crew got a late start, and broke something in the process (likely the saw), we're anxious to see what sort of progress they achieve tomorrow.

We talked to the superintendent today, and got a schedule of items left to complete, so here are the bigger points:

Stone retaining walls and spillway start - Today 06/01/2011

Clean-up (regrade, sprinkler re-route, moving the playhouse) - Tuesday 06/07/2011

Plaster - Tuesday 06/14/2011

Start-up - Thursday 06/16/2011

Swimming - 06/18/2011

We also have to fit in some planting, a dog run fence, and porch railing, but hopefully all of that can happen towards the end of next week. They also have to come back after the pool runs for 30 days to seal all of the stone and start the salt system, but we're getting pretty close to swimming!