It's Done! Now a bit of a rest

Yes yes yes, it's done. It's finally completed. 

We finished our fence.... whew! 

I look at it in amazement, knowing that each and every piece of it was stained by a paint roller on each surface, rotating as each previous surface dried .... (times TWO coats!) while setting on saw horses in the garage.

All stained by little old me! 

Steve hates painting or staining - he avoids it if at all possible.

 This is the LAST BATCH of over 500 spindles, 

stained in groups of 24 at a time

Yesterday morning we finished up the project by creating two more gates. We screwed in the hinges and latches and made sure everything was level and worked properly. Steve lag screwed them to the garage to increase sturdiness and make them swing level and not sag.

Once the gates were done and the entire area was secure, it was time to let the dogs loose for their newfound freedom. I had just bought 3 new play balls and put them in the backyard as an added surprise treat for their entrance to the area for the first time.

We are calling this space the "Big Backyard!" Here is their reaction to it as I caught it on video.

It was just so hilarious to watch them romp and play. They no longer have ropes dragging between their legs, tangling around their feet or impeding on their freedom. They can now run and chase and fetch all they want without being leashed. Plus, they are safe from going out on the busy street. Binney even laid on her back and rolled around in the grass like a little puppy.

In no time at all they figured out the back runway from the potty yard portion up by the back door, to run behind the garage down the runway, and access the big backyard. We put a gate there that we can close it off if we wish to just keep them in the closer smaller potty yard portion.

Both passageway doors into and out of our garage on each end are also enclosed within the fence. Now we can walk through the garage from the house to the backyard without ever opening a gate, making it even more secure. The gates can also be latched tight with a snap ring pin, so they are not opened easily or by accident from the grandchildren.

What joy and fun they are having

Our costs ran a little higher than we expected.
This is what we spent for our items:

• 19 long 4x4 pieces to cut into 38 posts - 347.82
• 68 horizontal boards - 268.40
• 528 spindles - 512.16
• hardware for 4 gates - 46.89
• 5 gallons Cabot solid color stain - 192.00
• bucket of coated deck screws - 74.98

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total materials is $1,442.95
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minus 11% rebate deal from Menards $158.72
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 total cost of materials after the rebate is $1,284.26

Then...we happened to stop back at Menards last week for exchanging a few of the damaged spindles from the bundles. Guess what? ALL our wood was now on SALE!  We handed over the receipts and they cheerfully refunded us an additional $151.72~~~

So our materials were only $1,132.54 plus tax.  Whew... I had budgeted $1,100 when we started this idea, so we really came in close!

Extra expenses were:

• Survey to locate our property lines $650.00
• Building permit required by the city $50.00
• We had a dump truck load of special fine gravel screening delivered by dump truck... it was used to pack around the posts, I will estimate at approx $20.00 (remainder of load is being used for our motorhome parking pad) 
• gas powered post hole digger borrowed from friends no charge
• manual post hole digger $22.49 but now we have it in our arsenal of tools

Our total project was 252 feet of fence and three new gates (we already had one). We wanted it to match the porch rail pieces we already had on the house. I think it was worth it, compared to the cheap pre-fab panels at the home improvement stores.

We grilled out last night and sat in the backyard to eat our supper. The dogs ran and frolicked around the yard, making laps to come back to our chairs, to thank us for making them such a fun place to play. (and get treats)

Steve has to work a couple hours today driving the old fart party bus. But otherwise, I think we are just going to take it easy for a day or two.  I think we need it!