Courtyard Lighting

Since our grass is St. Augustine it really needed to be de-thached. Luis took care of that and also seeded it, without charging me, with another type of grass to give it substance and keep it green in the winter.

Once the G-man got all the plants situated the next order of business was to put in the lighting. When we got our "expensive" quote, the lighting was quoted around $3,500. I know!!!! We could not believe it either.

So we turned to our friend, Mr. eBay. We were able to get the lights (6 up lights, 7 large mushroom path lights, 4 small mushroom path lights, and a 600w transformer) for around $450. Then I needed 500ft of wire, so that ran me another $280 for 10-2 AWG (Home Depot). All in all not too bad and a far cry under $3,500.

**Truth disclaimer**- I had some issues with installing the lighting. For some reason I was getting serious voltage drop and could not figure out why. So I had to call our electrician Ray. Turns out at the end of the first run I had both the wires tied together, apparently that is frowned upon in the electrical world.

Once that was brought to my attention the rest was pretty easy. I daisy chained each light in each run and then filled the wire nut connectors with silicone to seal them up.

We are very pleased so far. Next we need to build the gates and finish the fountain.