I don’t consider myself a "handy" person. In fact, if I can outsource something I will. So when we decided to get our interlocking walkway done, it made sense to us that we would call a company to get it done.

We saw some signs around our neighbourhood and figured that if our neighbours were using this company, they must be good. We got the number from one of the signs and called Mega-Loc Interlocking. It was a very, very bad decision, and we ended up getting scammed. They played off the power of community and scammed the whole neighbourhood at the same time. We thought that since the neighbours had already done their homework, we didn't have to. As you can see they have a horrible rating on Home Stars, a website I didn't even know about until we were scammed.

Five months after we signed the contract, our driveway ended up looking like this. 

And I cried about it here: 

We were then left with two choices: call another company, or do it ourselves. We had already used up a big chunk of our budget with the deposits that we gave to Mega-Loc Interlocking, so we decided to test out that Home Depot slogan "You can do it. We can help". As it turned out, we could do it and we did an amazing job, if I do say so myself!

Home Depot was a big help because everything we needed was  available for rent.

Here’s a bit about our process…

Before you start, it's important to measure the area, and figure out the design and what type of paving stones you want to use.

1. Use the walk-behind saw to cut the driveway where needed.

2. Dig. Even though they had excavated some of the area, it was poorly done and we had to remove the base gravel layer they had used because it was the wrong one. You can either hire someone to dig out the area or rent a container for the soil and a small excavator like this one.

3. We got two types of gravel from Home Depot to use as a base. First, we used larger gravel and then the compactor to press it down. Then we used Limestone Screenings and the compactor again (20 bags of each).

4. Set your paving stones. We got ours at a great price on sale, and they were delivered to our door.   You'll want to order in advance and have this ready when you start the process because you don't want to wait for the stones to be delivered if everything else is ready to go.

5. Put sand on top to finish it off, and use the compactor one last time to press it down firmly. We used 3 bags of sand and swept it into the cracks.

Voila! Just five easy steps to a new walkway..

We finished right on time too because it rained the next day :). We still have the stairs and landscaping to do, but the hard part is done. We are so happy with the way it looks! 

Of course, it’s a lot of work, and took us about three weekends to get it all done but we did it!

Our 6 year old also wanted to help. Once he heard we were going to Home Depot her ran and got his Home Depot Kids workshop Apron. 

So yes, we were scammed and we hope that you won't have the same experience, but we learned some valuable lessons. 

If you decide to do your next home improvement project yourself, head to your nearest Home Depot. 

I was provided with a gift card to cover a portion of the equipment rental, as always all opinions are my own.