Not All Bricks Survive a Fire Pit
Corinne stood in my backyard last Tuesday, hands on hips, looking at the pile of brick I’d hauled home over about six weekends, and said, “Isla. Some of those look…
Concrete Fire Pits: Great Look, Hidden Trap
I think about my fire pit more than is probably normal for a grown woman with a real job. Four nights a week, minimum, March through November, I am out…
Fire Pit on the Lawn: The Brown Circle Problem
I own three fire pits. Three. For one Boston backyard that is, and I am not exaggerating for effect here, twenty two feet by fourteen feet. That is not a…
Leaving a Fire Pit Alone for Just a Minute
I built my first fire pit out of an old brake drum I pulled off a customer’s truck, welded three legs on it in about twenty minutes because I was…
A Fire Pit Left Out All Year
I own four fire pits. Four. I said that number out loud to my sister last month and she just looked at me the way she looks at anything she…
Chimineas on Wood Decks: Tall, Top Heavy and Spark Prone
Everyone talks about chimineas like they’re the polite, contained cousin of a fire pit. Something you can tuck into a corner of a deck, light with one match, and forget…
A Fire Pit Inside a Gazebo: Cozy Idea, Careful Answer
Marcus texted me a photo at eight o’clock on a Friday night. New gazebo, cedar posts, asphalt shingle roof he’d put on himself over a long weekend, and sitting dead…
Fire Pit on a Concrete Slab
I bought my first fire pit off a clearance rack in early October, the kind of purchase that made complete sense at 9pm on a Tuesday and almost none the…
Patio Heaters Inside: The Reason They Live Outdoors
I nearly gassed myself on my own porch two Novembers ago, and I want to be upfront about that before I tell anyone else what to do with a patio…
Regular Cement in a Fire Pit: Fine Until It Is Not
I own fourteen fire pits at this point, which is a number I only know because I actually sat down one night and counted them off my phone, scrolling back…