All Saints Day Sees Block Laid

Phil managed to keep himself busy much of the morning, feeding cows and such. There's a hesitation that comes from not really knowing what we're doing as we commence the next section of construction.

And we had no idea what to expect. One online comment I read was from a person who laid five blocks in four hours. But a professional can do between 150 and 200 blocks a day. What was reasonable even to hope for?

Phil has a book on masonry construction, and we've watched a few amazing online videos detailing the process. But to gain experience you have to start, and on a day where the high was about 50 and the grey clouds hung low, it was hard to feel excited and happy to get moving.

After Phil assembled all the materials, he chiseled off a bit of the flanges on the blocks so even the corners would fit. All the bars remain intact.

We had to remeasure the volume of the cement. Unlike the 94 pound bags of cement for concrete, the cement for masonry comes in 72 pound sacks. It has the Portland cement and some lime, and when mixed, it uses just sand and water (no gravel).

We did a half bag in the concrete mixer, but Phil thought he'd added too much water, so we did a whole bag. It wasn't easy to get the right consistency: it needs to be firm enough that it will hold up under the weight of the concrete blocks, but soft enough that it will settle if pounded.

By this time, it was probably about 1pm on 11/1, and he put down the first block.

The corners are vitally important to be level in all directions (front to back, side to side, up and down, and from one corner to the next). The first corner, with its four blocks, took the better part of an hour, and the second corner, even longer. At first, the mortar was so dry that no matter how hard Phil pounded, the block wouldn't move. A little more water fixed that problem.

While Phil worked on the corners, I brought in more block. I woke up this morning and almost laughed at myself: why was I hauling blocks one by one, carrying them the whole way, when I have a handy wheelbarrow?

Three blocks, though, proved more than I could handle in the wheelbarrow. Even two was a challenge. Apparently, they weigh just over 50 pounds each, so it makes sense that maneuvering a wheelbarrow over uneven terrain would cause me some difficulty. In the end, I would prop the wheelbarrow's wheel on the ramp and haul one block, then another, from the block pallet. Then wheel the two over the ramp and across the gravel to the needed spot.

Over and over.

Once Phil had the corners in place, we moved faster. I would put down two layers of mortar, like railroad tracks, for the long sides of the block. Phil buttered the edges with mortar, then fit the block into place and tamped it down as needed.

My other responsibilities included sweeping the foundation to clear the space, filling in any dips in the foundation where the cleats were not perfect, tooling the edges (which is really neat, but you'll have to wait for a photo), scooping out the extra squashed mortar from inside finished blocks, and generally running any errands Phil needed.

We finished all four corners, and the two short sides. We had only a little mortar left when it got too dark to see the level's bubble, so we plopped the remainder into some cells that would have needed to be filled with grout later anyway and called it a day.

In the first five and a half hours of actual mortar work, we laid 47 blocks. We guesstimate that's about 1/30th of the entire project.

Right before we finished, I had to help Joe briefly. He said, "Jadon is making something. It's not a surprise, but I'm not supposed to tell you." (It turned out to be peanut butter cookies with chocolate chips.)

Apparently, Phil once did something similar at Joe's age. His mom had bought a hammer for Phil and his sister to give to their dad for his birthday, but warned the children not to tell.

"Dad!" said obedient Philip when his dad came home that night. "We did not get you a hammer for your birthday!"