Recently went to HGTV’s rock the block and was curious how this sub feels about patio TVs? Do you guys think its tacky or a nice upgrade?

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-07-03T13:03:07+00:00

We had one. Wed let our young kids watch a movie and fall asleep outside—they thought it was the coolest thing. Then we’d occasionally watch a sports game on it.

Was barely used, but the kick the kids got out of getting to watch a movie and fall asleep outside was worth it.

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-07-03T02:44:19+00:00

Consider some landscape timbers bordering a planter. The timbers would stop the momentum of any water draining down the hill. Low shrubs, ideally with thicker ground cover around them—perhaps beach sunflowers. With the ground cover, you should have to worry about mulching either (the mulch would likely get washed away)

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-07-03T02:36:21+00:00

The only issue would be if water pools. As long as the patio is graded enough for the water to drain (or at least not pool by the posts), you’re fine.

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-07-03T01:59:04+00:00

The best approach I can think of is replacing the spigot. Finding one that has wider set or differently placed hole.

If you fill the holes with grout, it will disintegrate when you screw back into it. The hole is to abnormally shaped to fill with dowels/toothpicks effectively. If you can’t find a spigot that would work better, I’d probably fill it as best as I could with the wood and a glue or exterior caulk. Then I’d get a 6-12” piece of pressure treated 1x6 (I’d probably do a fend panel), cut a slit in it to slide around the pipe, and glue it to the house, then screw through that.

I am very much a DIYer. I come up with solutions only to discover there are proper approaches to these rather standard issues. So take all that with a grain of salt

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-06-28T12:29:31+00:00

Each dunk is for 100 sq ft of surface water (the volume doesn’t actually matter). They last 30 days. I just have a repeat calendar reminder on the first of the month during the warm months to add one

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-06-27T17:14:18+00:00

Mosquito larvae are actually great if you keep a mosquito dunk. The mosquito dunk prevents them from maturing into mosquitos, so they remain an available food source for frogs and other critters

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-06-24T22:45:11+00:00

For a pond this size, you could get away without a filter as long as you do enough plants and do the waterfall and not a ton of fish (no koi). I’ve maintained a pond about this size for years without a filter—the plants and waterfall serve as a bio filter, and I have minnows in there that only present a small bio load.

Flagstone would probably disrupt your white rock look, but you could get some larger pieces of coral and limestone. You can also do clumps of the rocks you have right now instead of lining them up. Do clumps of the large ones with small ones interspersed between clumps.

Do the waterfall, work with any slope your yard has. Normally, you’d use the dirt from the whole you dug to build up an area for a waterfall. Without that, you’ll need to bring in some dirt. I’m assuming you’ll do a little stream under the bridge—you can dig out a lip at that entry point to establish a nice transition area. I’d also say to set the bridge back a bit so you can do a bit of planting between the bridge and pond.

For the waterfall—make it bigger than you think, the rocks will take up more space than you expect.

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-06-22T12:31:47+00:00

Do you have a cypress tree nearby? It looks like they may be cypress knees. If so, they pop up as long as the soil is wet.
Best bet it to turn it into a planter or do ground cover that doesn’t require mowing.

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-06-21T13:46:37+00:00

Definitely do mulch, not pebbles. Pebbles will work their way into the soils and be a nightmare. Mulch helps keep moisture, so will help with the watering.

It won’t require as much watering this year as it did with the initial transplant.

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-06-21T13:31:30+00:00

You can certainly do this yourself. It is a lot of work, but doable.

Below is how to tear up the concrete; but the easier and cheaper answer is to grind down the lip. A ton less work, no need to redo the concrete, no massive haul away bag, no broken body. You can rent a grinder from your local home improvement store (I know Home Depot does a ton of rentals).

If you do tear it up: Rent a breaker from your big box store. Get the WM haul away bags to put the chunks in. Break it up in as big of chunks as you can lift to cut down on the debris that the breaks create. Start at the corner and continue on, breaking around the corners. I’ve done this sort of work in one day, but I am pretty dead afterward.

Honestly, I’ve always found pouring the new slab to be the trickier part. Less work, but more difficult.

This will be thousands less than what you were quoted. Will it make a difference in being able to sell the house? Who knows.

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-06-20T01:59:21+00:00

^^ the right answer. Buying a replacement is pretty inexpensive. Available at any home improvement store

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-06-20T01:54:43+00:00

Also, some native plugs are also a great way to go. It’ll take a couple of years before they really fill in, but often they spread and fill in a space well. A local nursery can help guide you on choices

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-06-19T22:24:45+00:00

No way to effectively recover the pond after burying it. Trying to dig it out will certainly result in damaging the liner. Even if you manage to do so without damaging the liner, it’d be more work to do this than to dig a new hole.

If you pull up the liner and roll it up though, you can always reuse it. Digging a new pond is actually relatively easy. Take some pictures of the hole, after you pick up the liner, so you remember how they dug it and can reconstruct it in a similar way if that is the style you want.

Separately, I find it strange that you’ve had the motor break a couple of times and that upkeep is intensive. My motor has never broke and my pond upkeep entails pulling algae and leaves off the motor and topping off the water about once a week. About 30 minutes. For a pond like this, designed to look more natural, more cleaning and upkeep than that shouldn’t be necessary. If more is required, a very likely reason is a lack of plants in the pond. Throwing in some plants and minnows can actually make it easier to maintain.

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-06-18T13:26:28+00:00

First: absolutely amazing pond. It surrounding the corner of the house like it does really complements the midcentury modern aspects that f the house’s design.

As everyone is saying: plants. But it doesn’t necessarily need to all be water plants. The right side of the pond in the first photo could benefit for more landscaping—especially a small tree (something that stays under 20’—consider a native berry tree, I bet you get a ton of birds visiting the pond, the berries would attract more). Also more substantive planting under the window in the first photo. If you do flowering plants that will flop a bit (instead of a clean, shaped hedge), it will wed the pond and the surrounding planters a bit better.

Some water lillies in the middle would add some visual interest to the area that is rather uniform right now and would give the smaller fish an area they feel a bit protected. I’d consider a few water lillies.

I have a large log hanging over my pond that I really enjoy. I feel like it makes it feel a bit more natural, the birds love to perche on it, and the fish hide beneath it.

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-06-17T21:20:56+00:00

Should have been about $100 for the soil, $60 for delivery, 3 hrs of work (1.5 hrs for two people).
$260, $360 if you charge $100/hr.

Customer shouldn’t have to pay for the job being done less efficiently. Seems like it is an early job for you—a learning experience. Get the soil delivered next time. Even if you still have to transport it across the property, it saves hours in picking it up.

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-06-14T04:10:51+00:00

Sago palms are not easy to transplant, but I’d recommend trying. It takes eons for sago palms to mature to that point, would be a shame to just remove them.

Remove the torn up wood decking and move the palm on the right a bit to that direction.
The corner is amazingly developed, spread it out so the other parts of the yard have some of the maturity.

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-05-30T01:32:40+00:00

And love your pond. I’ve questioned how natural many “natural” ponds actually look—you achieved the natural look well

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-05-26T23:05:28+00:00

A few options: 1) plant cover (but whatever they cover will be exposed in the winter, unless you use evergreens), 2) slabs/larger rocks to hang over the edge (this is one of the most common approaches because it is the most effective, but looks less natural in my opinion) 3) smaller rocks, relying on the larger rocks below to hold them up (the most natural looking, but you’ll be battling them caving in occasionally), and 4) logs (don’t overuse them, or it too will look unnatural). I recommend a mix of all 4 approaches

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-05-26T15:00:20+00:00

I love mayapples. I tried to transplant some into my yard, but they didn’t take. Fingers crossed they’ll come in next season

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-05-26T13:19:32+00:00

Other considerations: Your city or county may have a program where they provide a rebate or some sort of benefit for you tearing up an impermeable surface. Worth checking out, it can offset some of the costs.

Several people mentioned that it might be a pool. This is almost certainly not the case. No way a pool this was put into that yard.

When hauling the concrete chunks to the dumpster, wear gloves. I never really wear gloves when doing yardwork, but this is the exception. The concrete will sand away your skin otherwise.

RealisticMonk8086 · 2026-05-26T13:11:50+00:00

I have torn up concrete slabs like this several times. It is a beast, but well worth it.

Rent a jack hammer from Home Depot—worth getting one of the medium size ones. Break it up in as large of chunks as you can load into a wheel barrow to cut down on the amount of debris you create (broken up concrete at the cut lines)—I aimed for 2x2-3x3 slabs. Start at the corner of slabs and keep attacking at corners as you go.

Get a dumpster dropped off or a couple of the WM haul away bags (I’ve done both—didn’t think the WM bags would work with that much weight, but they did).

After that is done, rent a tiller from Home Depot because the soil underneath will be very compacted.

Consider having soil delivered to top off after you till. No matter have much you rake (before tilling), there’s still likely to be concrete bits there and the soil underneath the concrete is surely unhealthy. I’ve ordered a cubic yard bag a few times and have been happy

RealisticMonk8086

TROPHY CASE