When we bought our house, there were two snakes living in the backyard.
Or at least I’m convinced they were living there.
We saw them more than once, and we watched them disappear underneath our deck. That was really all the evidence I needed. The deck had to go.
To be fair, the snakes weren’t the only reason. The deck was already starting to fall apart, and we had just had our son. We knew that as he got older, it wasn’t something we wanted to worry about him playing around.
But if I’m being completely honest, even if that deck had been in perfect condition, I don’t know that I ever would have been completely comfortable sitting on it knowing something could be slithering underneath me. I didn’t know yet that the answer would be a large concrete patio. I just knew I wanted to be able to go into my own backyard and relax, and apparently, for me, that required being able to see the ground.
The Backyard We Started With
The original setup was a little bit of everything. We had a small concrete patio directly behind the house, a wooden deck beside it, and brick pavers that ran from the backyard toward the front of the house. The little concrete patio was starting to fall apart, the deck needed to be replaced, and none of it really worked together.
We could have rebuilt the deck or repaired what was there. Instead, we decided that if we were going to spend the money, we wanted to solve the whole problem.
We would take out the deck, remove the old concrete and pavers, and pour one large concrete patio. Then we would continue the concrete around the side of the house so the backyard connected all the way to the front.
We reached out to a friend of my husband’s brother who did concrete work on the side. He had already done work at my brother-in-law’s house, so we had seen the quality of his work, and his pricing was reasonable.
The patio we planned was big—roughly 20 by 60 feet, although that’s our best estimate now. It was a much bigger investment than simply fixing what we had, and it was also one of the first major projects we did to this house.
And Then the Deck Came Out
My husband tore the deck out himself over a weekend in April. At the time, we thought the new patio would be coming pretty soon afterward.
It did not.
The concrete project didn’t actually happen until late June, which meant we went from having an old deck to having a very large patch of dirt outside the back door for a couple of months. This also happened to overlap with the eight weeks my husband was away in Texas for training.
So there I was, home with our eight-month-old son, looking out the back door at the place where our deck used to be for quite a while.
Eventually, though, work started. The old concrete came out, the ground was excavated, forms went in, and for the first time we could really see just how large this patio was going to be.
Instead of several disconnected areas, the new concrete would create one big, open space behind the house with a curved sidewalk continuing around the side. It was exactly what I wanted: flat, open, visible, with no mysterious space underneath.
Concrete Day Did Not Go According to Plan
When concrete day finally arrived, the plan was to use a concrete buggy to carry the concrete from the truck back to the patio. Everything was moving along until the buggy suddenly stopped working.
Luckily, we have an open easement beside our house that can’t be built on because of the utility lines underneath it, so there was another way in. They could bring the concrete truck through the easement and much closer to the backyard.
To get it all the way back to the patio, they needed to cut an opening in our fence. My husband was still away for training, so it was one of those decisions I hadn’t expected to be making on my own that day. It wasn’t some major disaster. It was just one of those project moments where the plan changes quickly, everyone else seems to understand exactly what needs to happen, and you’re trying to catch up.
So they cut the fence, brought the truck through the easement, and kept going. Not exactly the plan, but it worked.
After spending a couple of months looking at a dirt rectangle outside the back door, I was mostly just happy to finally see concrete.
The Patio Was Finished. The Backyard Wasn’t.
Once the concrete was finished, there was still plenty to do around it. The new patio and sidewalk changed the areas surrounding the house, so we added landscape fabric and new rock between the house and the concrete. We continued some of that rock toward the front of the house as well.
That rock is actually a good example of how our house keeps evolving. It worked for what we needed then. Now that we’ve made more changes to the exterior, we’re planning to move some of the rock from the front to the backyard and replace those front sections with black slate that will work better with the house.
Nothing has to be a forever decision just because it was the right decision at the time. The patio itself, though? That one has stuck.
We Didn’t Buy Patio Furniture For Almost a Year
Our patio was finished in June 2023. We bought our patio furniture in May 2024.
For almost an entire year, we had this huge new patio without the furniture we imagined eventually putting on it. Part of that was because we needed some time to figure out how we actually wanted to use the space.
We talked about a sectional, a dining table and chairs, maybe a bar-height table, and possibly lounge chairs. We even considered adding a gazebo or some type of awning, but I worried that covering part of the patio would affect the natural light coming into the house, so we didn’t do it.
When it came time to finally buy furniture, we decided the dining table and chairs were the most useful place to start. We found a set with a fire pit built into the middle of the table, which checked several boxes at once.
More than two years later, that’s still the only major patio furniture we’ve bought.
I still want the sectional. We have plenty of room for one, and I fully expect we’ll eventually get it. It just hasn’t made its way high enough on the priority list yet.
The open portion of the patio also gets used constantly by our kids. They draw with chalk, play, and spread their things out. A sectional could still fit without taking that away, but right now there’s no reason to rush to fill every open section just because the space is there. We’ll buy it when it makes sense for us.
There is also the slightly ridiculous fact that our dining set came with a cover, and we’ve been so determined to keep the furniture nice that we frequently don’t uncover it at all. We sit on the concrete stoop instead.
Apparently we spent all that time deciding which patio furniture was most important so we could protect it while sitting beside it.
Three Years Later, I’d Do it Again
There are plenty of things in our house that I would do differently if I were starting over today. The patio isn’t one of them.
Three years later, I love the size. I love the layout. I love having one large, open surface instead of the old combination of a small patio, deck, and pavers. Most importantly, we actually use it.
Our kids are constantly out in the backyard now, running around and playing. We don’t have to worry about anyone falling through an aging deck board or tumbling off the side. There’s plenty of open space for them now and still room for us to eventually add more furniture without the patio feeling crowded.
And yes, I am considerably more comfortable knowing there isn’t a dark space underneath a deck where I have to wonder what might be living there. Peace of mind counts too.
This project was a real investment. We could have spent less and repaired or replaced pieces of what we already had, but that wouldn’t have solved the problem we actually wanted to solve. We didn’t need another deck. We wanted a backyard that worked differently.
That’s the distinction I’ve learned to pay attention to with our house. It’s the same idea behind KEEP, MOVE, CHANGE, and INVEST. Sometimes what you have is worth keeping. Sometimes moving something or changing it is enough. And sometimes you know exactly what isn’t working, what you want instead, and why it’s worth spending the money.
For us, this was one of those times.
The patio still isn’t filled with everything I eventually want out there, and it doesn’t need to be. We invested in the part that mattered first.
The rest can come when it makes sense.