My chief goal this summer was to rip out my unsightly, peeling and warped deck, and replace it with a paver brick patio. Working at Angie’s List, I’ve learned a lot while interviewing home-improvement specialists for our magazine’s Comparative Shopper column and other stories. Advice on how to improve my home’s resale value always gets my attention. So, that said, I knew replacing the deck with a patio that not only looks lovely but is also maintenance free was the way to go.

My husband, however, chalked the idea up to a womanly impulse to spend our hard-earned money and nearly chickened out at the last minute. He hated the deck, but he said, “I can build a new one… installing a patio can’t be that difficult, I can do it myself.” Now, that’s a manly impulse.

Luckily, he stepped away from the power tools and let me hire a landscaper off the List to do the job. But I didn’t win the entire battle. He decided we could at least tear out the old, oversized deck by ourselves. Fair enough.

That turned out to be a lot harder than we expected. (Big surprise there!) And why he didn’t invite over other manly men to help haul the splintered boards — complete with sharp, rusty nails — I’ll never understand. Maybe he just wanted some quality time with the wifey.

Armed with a crowbar and sledgehammer, the first half of demolition went painfully slow. He finally got a brilliant idea four hours into the project (yes, four hours and we were only halfway there), to grab his saw and go to town. The second half took a brisk 30 minutes.

Next came the conundrum of where to dump this mess. He apparently didn’t know it’s very much illegal to drop it off in a random dumpster. We finally located the local transfer station, after getting lost a couple of times over several days, only to find out they charged $50 per truckload — and we had three.

I’m guessing it would have been cheaper to have someone who knew what they were doing get rid of the deck for us, especially when you figure in the amount of time and energy we put into it. I asked my husband, “How much is your time really worth to you?” Lesson learned. Good luck to you women whose husbands choose to complicate matters instead of referring to the List!

Regardless, we ended up with a fantastic patio that we’re both very proud of. Even our dog, Buddy, loves it: the bricks get nice and cool in the evening, and he fits perfectly on our new stoop. That’s a big relief, considering how ticked off he was when we tore out the deck. We left him a little section of boards to lay on while we sawed away, but the dirty looks he kept giving us let us know he wasn’t thrilled with the destruction.

I can’t wait to host a summertime cookout on our new patio. Before that, we must shell out a little more money to get some new outdoor furniture to replace our $9.99 camping chairs that are adorning it now. Let's just hope my husband doesn’t want to try his hand at furniture fabrication!