We had all intentions of getting an early start on our retaining wall Saturday morning, but I woke up around 4:15 to the sound of pouring rain outside the open window. After it rained for 4 more hours, there was no chance we could work out there on Saturday. We made sure to start early Sunday morning and we were almost finished when we ran out of light and sand (or so we thought). This morning I made yet another trip for sand, but in the end we didn’t need it. We got the last blocks in place and fixed up all caps including some that needed some persuasion to lay flat.

The project grew quite a bit from start to finish. We used almost 130 blocks and about 35 caps (which we weren’t sure we’d do initially). In the end, the wall ended up being about twice as long as I had initially anticipated because we decided to go all the way from the sidewalk to the window well.

I think it turned out great and our neighbors seem to agree. See the construction progress below and click for larger versions.

Removing grass was a pain, but the real work was yet to come.

Making progress...

This is about the point we decided to go end to end and made the project a lot larger.

The finished product; we debated about what to do on the left side.

Ready for planting.