I should have taken a picture of the big pile of dirt before I began so you could see exactly how big it was, but I didn’t. I think you can still approximate the size from this angle.
So long story short, I needed a big pile of dirt, enough to cover a little over 200 square feet to an average depth of six inches and if my math calculations were correct given what the dirt delivery people told me, that worked out to about six and half square yards, but just to be safe, I ordered seven square yards. Now, it has been quite awhile since I needed to use math for a practical application and I rather thought that a square yard would be about nine square feet since a yard only has three feet in it, but the dirt delivery people said their square yard was ten feet by ten feet and would be two inches deep.
But no matter whose math was mathematically correct, I had a big pile of dirt delivered this morning and shortly thereafter, borrowed a wheel barrow from my environmentally conscious neighbors because I don’t own a wheelbarrow. And then the spreading began. I was the only one spreading the dirt because the person who had said he would help, got a little wishy washy about the whole thing and it is better if the dirt stays dry until it is spread to its final resting place, so wishy washy types are probably not the best types to have around dirt that you want to remain dry until it meets its fate.
Now, some of you might be wondering if I thought about the role weather might play in keeping the big pile of dirt dry. I did. I wanted to get this project completed before it gets hot and humid which typically begins sometime in May. April is a dry month in these parts so the dirt should remain relatively dry, not that I thought I would need a whole month when I planned this project.
Before I began the dirt spreading process, I thought I could have it mostly done by the end of the weekend. After spending almost three hours shoveling dirt into the wheelbarrow, then pushing the wheelbarrow to where the dirt was needed, then dumping the dirt out of said wheelbarrow, then spreading it around and finally stamping it down, I’m reconsidering that timeline. I didn’t include the time spent trying to determine how level or close to level it was in my previous sentence because it didn’t seem that important because it doesn’t need to be perfectly level, but I did try to approximate levelness which may not be a word, but it didn’t take that much time. Now, I’m just hoping to be able to get it done in a couple of weeks.
I’m also hoping to be able to get out of bed tomorrow so that I can spread more dirt. Otherwise it’s going to take more than a couple of weeks.
So that’s my plan for the next few days or weeks. Hope you’re doing something equally or even more fun than dirt spreading this weekend. But if not, and you live nearby and have your own shovel, then stop by and you, too, can feel the joy (or whatever else that is that my back is feeling right now) that can only be had by spreading dirt. Seriously (not really), it’s loads of fun which is about all you can ask of a load of dirt.
Because one picture of a big pile of dirt wasn’t enough and you can see how much I accomplished today from this angle, here’s a second picture of a big pile of dirt. I’m hoping the next picture you see, will be smaller, well, not the picture, but the pile of dirt in the picture.
sandylikebeach 