Building a Backyard Fire Pit

Usually I'm the person who gets her monthly magazine and blows through it within hours. This past month I've been slowly dying waiting for my new This Old House magazine to come in the mail (the last one was a July/August issue). When it finally came this month, I've been taking my time with it.

Last night I was extremely excited to come across an article on how to build a backyard fire pit. Seeing this article makes me drool at the thought of building our own fire pit. As it stands now, Jason and I use a portable metal fire pit we found last summer after someone had abandoned it on the street. It works well, but every time we use it, it leaves a dead grass spot for a few weeks. I've even tried soaking the grass before starting the fire, but it didn't do one bit of good.

I must admit that I've been very hesitant about any permanent structures in our backyard. Occassionally Jason will mention the idea of creating a stone or brick patio, but I always sidestep him. Who knows if one day we'd like to set up a badminton net or have a slip-n-slide? Why not use our porch (to be built in the future - we're currently using an ugly front deck) if we want solid footing for outdoor dining? So we probably won't build the fire pit since I like the flexibility with our current backyard.

And what is funny is that it looks like Hi-Fi Bungalow is also thinking about their backyard. Their post led me to the Sunset web site which has a photo of exactly how I want our flagstone paths to look like. The photo is buried within instructions on how to lay a path. I can't wait until I get to set up our paths.

I've also wanted to build stone pillar planters on our property. The idea came from the April 2007 This Old House magazine (no links available on their site). I've even sketched the layout of our property...