Have patience with adding water and you can quickly find yourself becoming more familiar with the total amount needed on any given day. If you take the time to measure how much water you need in a mix, the next time you make it you can immediately use half the anticipated amount of water required, and add the second half very slowly to ensure that you do not over water.

Making perfect concrete mixes takes patience and practice

What you are going for with this mix is a relatively firm (not too watery) end result. The concrete should be able to be formed into a ball, but still squished between your fingers without breaking off into clumps. Instead it should almost ooze through your fingers. If you dropped a fist sized ball of concrete onto the ground from the height of your knees you should end up with an almost flat circle of concrete, but not totally flat. Pictures of the desired consistency are included in the sculpting section.

Try taking your point trowel and smoothing out the concrete like spreading icing on a cake. You should be able to get a smooth glossy-like finish by working it back and forth gently. If the concrete just spreads out to nothingness under the gentle weight of your trowel you have too much water. If the concrete tends to break apart instead of spreading smoothly you likely need just a touch more water. A little goes a LONG way at this point.

Once the concrete is mixed - pay attention to the ticking clock

You will have a few hours in most cases to work the concrete into its desired shape before it cures too much to be worked further. Direct sunlight and hot dry weather can considerably increase the curing rate of concrete so it is always better to err on the side of caution with concrete drying times as you certainly do not want a batch of concrete drying in the mixer before you can get to it. This goes for tools as well. Always keep your tools clean or you will quickly find all of your tools rendered useless by dried concrete.