I was reading the gazebo plans and the first step is to layout the location of the footings. The directions simply say, using batter boards layout a 12 ft x 12 ft area making sure the corners are square and the string line level. This might be simple if I knew what batter boards were. Off to the Internet to search “batter boards” and using them in a layout. I am fortunate enough to have a good friend who does this kind of stuff for a living so she gave me some tips and it all sounded pretty straight forward to me.
How hard can it be for someone with an a degree in engineering to layout a 12 ft x 12 ft square with string and make it level? Apparently very hard.
After about 3 hours on Monday evening my husband and I were on each other’s last nerves and we still didn’t have a 12ft x 12ft area marked off that was square or level. He wisely suggested that we stop and get some dinner before either of us said something we would regret…I married a very wise man.
Here is a picture of where we ended up at about 7:30 pm on Monday night.
Nothing is level or square. We woke up the next morning and all the strings were broken, my husband blamed it on the cats. We are regrouping and going to start over.
I have spent some more time reading step by step instructions and I think we have a good plan. I’m determined that my next posting will describe our successful layout.