Ring of Fire: We Built A Fire Pit

A friend and I decided to get a little crazy these past two days and build the fire pit that I've been dreaming of! Now while it wasn't a breeze to build, it certainly wasn't that difficult. Thankfully we've been working out in preparation for our husbands to come home and were able to use our brand new muscles.

After a bit of searching and internet investigating, I found a local landscaper that would build the pit for $1200. What?! No. They would deliver all of the materials for a mere $900. Thanks, but no. From there I decided to see what I could get from Lowe's or Home Depot.

Going into Lowe's, I was expecting to pick up one of their $200 kits with all of the bricks and metal ring included for you. Well after seeing the kit, that wasn't going to happen. Boy were those bricks ugly. The nice man at the store said it'd just be cheaper for me to just pick my own bricks and get the ring separately any way. Ok. Seems simple enough. Jacquie and I proceeded to load 68 wall pavers onto the flat cart with the employee's help. We also needed 2 bags of paver base and 2 tubes of Liquid Nails. I already had some of the tools (shovel, rake, level) but needed to borrow the hand tamper from a friend.

Friday morning started bright and early at 8:30am with us digging up a 5ft x 5ft area of grass. This was one the hardest part. We removed the grass and then started raking the dirt level. Once we were satisfied with the level of the dirt, we dumped the paver base and leveled that. The hand tamper was used to pack that down. I made sure that everything was level while Jacquie started bring the pavers from the back of the truck.

Jacquie kept bringing the pavers while I started placing them in a circle. I thought CrossFit was tough but it's nowhere near as physically demanding as building a fire pit was. As I laid each paver, I had to make sure that they were level with one another. The first layer was really the only one that we had to worry about. For each additional level, we applied some Liquid Nails and placed the paver over the space of the two pavers below.

The three top layers didn't take much time at all to stack up. When everything was complete, we poured some egg rocks around and called it a day. The two of us were SO surprised at how well everything turned out. The total project was less than $250 including all the extra little materials that went into the construction. My pit is four layers high of pretty textured brick while the one that they sell in the kit is a kinda ugly plain three layered pit.

I haven't shown Hubster yet because I want it to be a surprise when he comes home on R&R. He is going to be shocked that his wife and her friend put this thing together. It's much too hot to use the fire pit now, but I can't wait for Hubs to be home for good in December so that we can snuggle and toast marshmallows.