A neighbor’s gate looked similar. I measured the area, purchased a couple of bags of gravel and a couple of bags of sand. And some pavers, they were both 14”x14” and 24”x24” or so. The smaller pavers were lighter.

i Dug out some dirt, laid the gravel and sand, tamped it, then placed the pavers.

Dig out the grass, lay in 2-3 inches of gravel, 1-2” of sand, temp, I like the pavers to touch. It is not fancy, I do not used poly metric sand, nor did I plant grass between.

What do you want, I wanted Ron to not have a depression/muddy spot in front of his gate.

Can you lift50# bags of sand, pavers? How old are your children? Can they help?

Ron is a retired mechanic who has helped me. He just has bad hips and back and is ~80yo.

Does the gate get high traffic? Since there is no indication in the grass of traffic, I am not sure that I would do anything. The fence will shade parts of the yards so may make grass problematic.

It it is low traffic, you may wish to consider adding 7"x!2" paver directly under the fence line. If it looks a little odd to you, you could put pavers under the whole fence giving you a buffer so you could mow close to the fence and not have to trim the fence line. In one house we had I put those pavers all along the house creating an "Sidewalk" for the mower, that did not require trimming along the house.

If this gate gets a lot of traffic, you may consider a nice paver path from the patio through the gate to what ever is beyond. Where the path passes through the fence you could widen it to fill the gate opening. and extend about a paver width on each side of the fence.

Gate does not get a lot of traffic - I just wanted to add a few pavers right when you enter the backyard from the gate/possibly under the gate. (I don't want a walkway from the gate to the patio).

I was looking at your pictures again. You may be able to correct your problem by cutting an inch or two from the bottom of the gate.

This will create a space under the gate to allow the sun to reach the area. It will also prevent scuff damage from the gate as it is opened and closed.

This may not be practical if you have a small animal that could slip through he opening the would be created.

krnuttle - not an option, but thank you. Again, just wanting to put a few pavers down in the mud area.

I have to hire help as I cannot lift anything at this time and have no children old enough to help. Can you lay concrete pavers (from a home store) side by side and not have things growing in between? I don't like the idea of having them spaced out and having grass in between - seems more work/maintenance - how would you cut that grass?

You might not like this answer, but as soon as you put pavers in, you have to keep up with the adjacent grass/weeds. You cut grass in a small area with a string trimmer. Or you could spray around the paver with RoundUp to keep the grass/weeds from encroaching.

Yes you can use the concrete pavers from HD or Lowe's. We did this, but we don't have children kicking stones around.

Those are 18x24 stones from Lowe's with 3/4-inch chipped stone in between. It's all held together with steel landscape border, also from Lowe's. The chipped stones lock together and don't flow around like rounded pea gravel does.

Another thing we did and would do again is place is use these paver base panels.

At $13 (Lowe's) each they seem expensive, but they saved a lot of time preparing a base for a level paver. We spent days prepping for our first walkway and only a couple hours prepping with these base panels.

If that area is constantly moist, you're watering too much. Your entire yard should dry out completely before watering. I'm not saying the plants should be dead, but the soil under the lawn, for example, should have been dry for at least a few days before watering. If it is still wet, you don't need to water.

I remember your other post about this. I think you may be over thinking it. :)

If you have to hire this out, then call someone (small landscape crew or even a general handyman) and just get it done. This is not a hard job. The folks above described various ways it can be accomplished and it won't take more than an hour or so to do.

If you already mow the grass anyway, and you want the pavers set flush....then whoever mows the grass drives over the pavers. Or you can weed that small space as needed in approximately 7 seconds. Or you can try using polymeric sand between the joints and that works for awhile. Or you can use the decorative stones if you want wider joints, which is a pretty look but they do get kicked around and get messy. (Which again, can be corrected in that small of an area in about 7 seconds.)