Tips for Building a Backyard Fire Pit
How to Instrutions on Building your Backyard Fire Pit
Bringing my family together was my goal. Creating a place that we could gather together in the early evening that didn’t include a television took some thinking. A fire pit is a small dug out pit where you can begin a camp fire and just gather around and speak. It is a somewhat cozy way of getting warm and at the same time bonding with the people around you.
For so many years, a fire pit has been used for outdoor activities and camp outs to foster good relations among campers. Getting people around a fire and speaking about anything under the night sky just create a mood that is hard to describe. But how to build a fire pit has been a topic of many camp fires because it usually requires some planning and thought. You don’t want the fire pit too close to any structures that might catch fire easily or any dried up plants or wood that are highly flammable.
Keep Safety in mind when Building your Fire Pit
Starting with the basics is alway a solid decision. You want to consider the size of your fire pit. You don’t need to build a huge hole nor do you need a lot of open space. Initially plan for your fire pit to be about a foot and a half in circumference.
How to build a fire pit is simple once you have all the materials ready. You need some digging tools and some pea gravel and sand. You will also need some concrete pavers or blocks to surround your fire pit with. Check with your local home supply company, like Home Depot or Lowe’s for the tools and materials you need.
Gather your fire pit supplies, then mark the circumference by drawing a circle on the ground. Make sure you dig your fire pit about one foot deep. In the center of your first hole, you want to dig another hole about six inche around and another eight to twelve inches deep.
You’ll want to fill both holes with pea gravel and then add about three inches of sand at the very top of the fire pit. Your sand should bring the level of the fire pit back to the level of the ground. Now surround your fire pit with your concreate pavers or blocks. You want to stack your pavers high enough that your logs won’t roll out of the pit.
You might want to also build a nice place to sit around the fire pit. A simple bench can be constructed using a couple of cinder blocsk and a six foot length of redwood 2?6 lumber. Dress up the bench by using “Key Stone” landscaping blocks. These blocks are typically used to build retaining walls and come in a wide variety of textures and colors.
It doesn’t have to be costly to build a backyard fire pit. Make it a fun family project.
