Another early start...

 

I was up at 6:00.  The landscape guys were hard at it shortly after 6:30.  Right now, at 7:20, they are jack-hammering the landing right outside the door from our living room to the yard.  Rufus said to me, "I think someone is trying to break in."

"It's OK, buddy - pretty soon you'll have a nice yard to explore."

After showering, I got a guitar out to make some music for the furry boy - figured it would be soothing for him.  The jack-hammering was now right next to our door; I took Rufus to the music room, closed the door and started playing for him again.  Joan came in and said, "Right after you left, they stopped the jack-hammering"... I started taking Rufus to the living room and the noise fired up again.  Nope.

I put the guitar away and got Rufus ready for a walk.  We didn't get far when I saw they had some of the pavers in place on the "skinny side" of the yard (my description)...

 That will be nice when done, including a platform for where the garbage and recycle cans will go (they're in the garage right now).  I took Rufus back inside and went around to the south side to visit with Robert.  He assured me they are keeping our part of the yard, right outside our door, as low as possible and are keeping spacing from the house and neighbor in mind on the other side of the yard.

Here's a view of some trim added on Steph and Dan's side...

And, the ground work started on our side...

More progress.

I had finalized everything with the Tuff Shed people yesterday and was told they'd be sending me a secure payment portal.  The link for that didn't come until after midnight last night - when I tried it this morning, the link was "broken."  I called them directly right after they opened and the salesman was able to take my 50% payment on the phone.  He said he'd call me right back after visiting with their production people for a day next week to install it.  I was originally told to plan "about 10 days out."

Bobby (the salesman from Tuff Shed, filling in for Neil, my original sales guy), true to his word called me back after a few minutes: they can deliver/build/install the shed on Monday.  "Next Monday?  As in 6 days from now?"

"Yes, sir - if that works for you."  I had told him that Wednesday was the only day that didn't work on that first phone call this morning.  Sooner than anticipated - no down side to that!

Even more progress.

Joan is keeping a calendar of everything being delivered, worked on, or scheduled.  Steph called with a date for an electrician to come in to fix everything the handyman didn't do right (all to do with installing the ceiling fans)... all it takes is money.

It's beginning to feel like the movie The Money Pit - if you said, "1986, starring Tom Hanks and Shelley Long," you get 20 bonus points.

On the bright side, the jack-hammering is done and we're back to the usual construction noises of concrete saws, pounding, a front end loader, and Mexican music.  The sounds of progress.

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I made a walk-around about 11:00.  Robert, whose company is doing the landscaping, wasn't there.  The 6 guys in his crew were working away.  I saw some lines in the dirt - they were laying out the spacing for the Tuff Shed... about 15 feet further forward than where it is supposed to be.  Good timing, glad I caught that before they started the work in that area.  I went inside and brought out the plot plan on my laptop and 3 of us looked it over.  Between my bad Spanish and their bad English, I think we managed to figure it out.  I stayed with them while they marked out the proper positioning.

A couple more progress photos...

More of the walkway on Steph and Dan's side (above); more ground work on our side...

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More images of today's progress...

Working on the patio on our side (above) and the walkway (below)...

That walkway will be the outdoor connection between Steph and Dan's place and ours.  Each will have their own private outdoor area.  If it seems that I am spending a lot of time photographing and writing about this, the yard was larger than it looked in the images Steph and Dan sent us during the building process.  And Joan was very firm that we don't want dirt... and no way we were even considering grass (although there will be some turf, just to add a splash of green back there.  We are putting almost 10% of the cost of the house into this additional landscaping.

Robert's crew is working hard - it is a flurry of activity out there, and it is very physical work...

By late afternoon, more of the patio on our side is taking shape...

That is a good size patio.  There will be a pergola over some of it.

Prep for the area where the Tuff Shed will sit...

Back to Steph and Dan's side to see how the paver trim is shaping up...

The mostly completed walkway on the skinny side...

When all is done, anything that isn't pavers or turf will be that gray colored gravel.  No dirt.  No grass.  As all this stuff is coming together in the yards, the space is looking smaller, compared to how it looked last week...