I've been so looking forward to the day I could finally write this post and that day is finally here, you guys! I am excited to share all the ins and outs of our backyard build. From April to August, we worked on the projects almost every weekend. Between Covid, coaching sports teams, and lots of forest fire smoke... we were met with a few challenges along the way but now I'm here sitting down underneath my beautiful pergola and relaxing in the space I truly envisioned from the beginning.
*This post is sponsored by MicroPro Sienna, but all opinions are my own.

Alright, so let's go allll the way back to the beginning so you can truly see how we got to where we are now. Our backyard is small… I mean, pretty small for backyard standards here in Calgary. We hardly had any grass and the majority of the space had pavers laid down from the previous owners. Oh, and a big ugly round fire pit. So, there was nothing visually appealing here, nothing that screamed “come on over and relax”. Our goal was to make this as much of an outdoor living space as we could, using the existing space with pavers for the new deck build while keeping as much of the grass for the dogs.
Just because your yard is small doesn’t mean you can’t have an inviting, private little oasis of your very own, am I right!?

So, in 2020, we took out the first itty bitty deck that came with the house, which was only big enough to hold a bbq and a chair or two. We replaced that with the first deck we ever built and we loved it! It was a nice new space that went over as far as the dining room window. We also built a privacy wall and a railing along the edge of the deck and now we use it for bbq-ing and dining.
Our goal for this year was to complete the second phase of our deck build by extending it out even further, creating a relaxing lounge zone with a pergola and a second privacy wall. We couldn’t wait to get started, so we were thrilled when our order of MicroPro Sienna treated wood arrived from The Home Depot in April 2021!
The first thing we did when it arrived was slowly load it into the garage, board by board. We were sure not to lay the pile directly on the garage floor. Instead, we laid it on top of some 2x4's to protect it from the ground.
