Seeing your grill and firepit gives a better idea of what you're trying to accomplish. I think extending the patio with aggregate material will work out fine for you. Calling it "pebbles"... which sounds "clean" and of uniform size has me thinking you're envisioning the wrong kind of material to build it of. I'm including a link below that shows some samples of the types of material that would work well. Notice that each is made of little chips, smaller chips, angular sand and dust. It's the combination of sizes that allow it to pack down tightly, as each little particle settles (fits) in closely to the other particles. (This is not possible with "clean," uniform size material.) Even though an individual particle of aggregate is angular, the top surface of the whole compacted area, because of the way each particle fits together (and that none is particularly large) is flat and smooth. When "weed barrier" is placed above the compacted soil (or subgrade) before placing aggregate material, it's function is not as a weed barrier, but as a soil separator and stabilizer... which is the good way to use this material. ("Weed barrier" fabric that is made of rubber-like material or is stretchy will not work for this.) Imagine a stone on top a wet, saturated ground. It would be pretty easy to put some weight on that stone and push it down into the mud. But if there was a piece of tough, non-sretchy fabric between the ground and the stone... providing that the fabric didn't "give," it would be about impossible to push the stone into the soil. What "holds" the fabric and prevents it from "giving" is that you are putting down AN ENTIRE COMPACTED LAYER of heavy material on top of it. Then, pressure applied to one small spot of the aggregate "paved" area will be resistant to deforming. Given that the area you are constructing is quite small and the fact that it's for light duty, would incline me to think that stabilizer fabric is optional, not critical. (It would be pretty easy to top dress any depressions that formed over the life of area.) The most important considerations are the aggregate you choose and it's thickness (min. 3",) the edge restraint and compaction of the layers. Manual compaction would work OK for this small project. Crushed brick (as long as it contains "fines") is another material that would work for this project... Here is a link that might be useful: Path and trail aggregate materials

A recent update from the person who received the yucca is that it is green and doing well. The transplanted cholla are doing well, of course, but it will be a while before I know if any sacaton survived. We have been making progress but not as quickly as we hoped. (No surprise there! ;-) ) We have the foundation blocks for the outside beds in place up to ground level and filled with dirt. Pavers have been placed, but not yet leveled, between the existing shed and the north edge of the foundation. We have the water and electrical stubbed in. We have the SHCS tubes in place for the outside beds of the east greenhouse and hope to start filling that section soon with the removed dirt. We have removed all planned use of poured concrete from our plans and have made this planned structure possible to remove easily while still unlikely to be blown away. (Mostly due to bolting the foundation via J-bolts to rebar under bond beam cement blocks.) DH will be checking to see what type of permits/inspections we will need for electrical, water, and structures. I suspect that it will be just water and electric. We won't fill in any more until we find out. It is getting hot already so we will be putting in the outside structure and shade cloth before the central shed and greenhouses. That way we can work in the shade. :-)

I changed the entrance of my shower tub. The panel board was moldy; water was getting in between the top tiles and the panel board. the joint was not well sealed. I put new everything for the entrance, even a membrane between the plywood and the tiles. However, it seems to leak from the wall now. Water is coming out of the wall outside the shower tub. Would it be the grout, tiles...? Tiles and grout are probably 20+ yrs old ( turquoise tiles). I tried to put some ready grout ( in a tube), but it still leaks! Calking is well done. Should I remove the old grout and put new one everywhere? Thanks for your help!

We are planning to eventually build out a deck around the other side of the house, but that won't happen for a while (there is a fire escape in the way. It's an old house, and that's a whole other story...). The lot is only ~50-55' wide at that point (pretty densely packed mostly single-family houses), so I think having too large (especially too wide) of a deck would be weird. The half patio/half deck gives a compromise of more useable space without having the deck as the whole outdoor space and running the width of the yard. Rereading your comment, though, are you suggesting to replace the stoop entirely and build the patio up to the stoop stairs? The two-stage plan would give us house-level decking and ground-level patio.