The steps

The insurance company was less than thrilled with the condition of the back steps.  It was a concrete staircase that led from the back yard up to the sun room.  It had about 12 steps and it really didn't look nice.  The stairs themselves were covered in moss and the sides of the structure were crumbling.  The choice then became do we fix them or rip them out?  Well, we chose to rip them out becuase 1) they were ugly and 2) it would allow more light into the downstairs apartment and give the tenant a view of the creek.  We thought this was going to be an easy project that we could bang out in just one weekend.  Ha!  Turns out that each step was had steel re-bar in them.  We rented a jackhammer and with the help of Tom, Dr. George, and my dad, we began to break it up. 

Turns out that the first jackhammer had a loose connection in it and as a result did not work properly and then broke.  We got another and kept at it.  It took about 3 weekends to complete the break up.  We were left with about 4 tons of concrete sitting in a huge pile on our lawn.  This is how I lost 15 pounds.  We had to carry each and every piece of the concrete up the stairs from our yard to the street level and load it into the pickup truck that Nick bought to help with out project.  It was horrible.  But after many trips to the dump, lots of sweat, loss of weight and even some muscle gain - we finished the first major part of our project.   Yes!