Paving progress...
Apr. 9th, 2011 02:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
urban_retreatSaturday saw the near completion of something I'd been wanting to do since last summer - laying paving between the raised beds.
The original idea had been to do this on Tuesday but this being London and springtime rain stopped play.
In the end the delay was good as it allowed me to tidy up the two raised perennial beds and plant some new additions and also to tidy up and underplant the area under the Acer and the small bed in front of the winter and summer jasmines. Which in turn meant we had much more space to work to lay the paving and were spared falling over plants, pots and bags of compost.
We started at 10:30am, with three minor delays to rush out and buy:
(a) a decently long bulders level )I have a builders level but it is in the attic. We shall not speak of how utterly cluttered the attic is with All The Things brought back from Sheffield after selling the house I grew up in).
(b) more sand (the compacted soil sloped deceptively from the base of the fire escape towards the rear of the garden so the sharp sand base got much thicker towards the end)
(c) a piece of treated wood to form a retaining end piece for the path and stop the sand eroding away.
However, by 2pm we had succeded!
I had a wonderful path...and the dawning realisation that the one thing I hadn't bought was gravel to dress the side of the path/between the slates. But that's gardening isn't it? There's always soemthing else to do or something you've forgotten.
Oh well, there's always tomorrow!
The original idea had been to do this on Tuesday but this being London and springtime rain stopped play.
In the end the delay was good as it allowed me to tidy up the two raised perennial beds and plant some new additions and also to tidy up and underplant the area under the Acer and the small bed in front of the winter and summer jasmines. Which in turn meant we had much more space to work to lay the paving and were spared falling over plants, pots and bags of compost.
We started at 10:30am, with three minor delays to rush out and buy:
(a) a decently long bulders level )I have a builders level but it is in the attic. We shall not speak of how utterly cluttered the attic is with All The Things brought back from Sheffield after selling the house I grew up in).
(b) more sand (the compacted soil sloped deceptively from the base of the fire escape towards the rear of the garden so the sharp sand base got much thicker towards the end)
(c) a piece of treated wood to form a retaining end piece for the path and stop the sand eroding away.
However, by 2pm we had succeded!
I had a wonderful path...and the dawning realisation that the one thing I hadn't bought was gravel to dress the side of the path/between the slates. But that's gardening isn't it? There's always soemthing else to do or something you've forgotten.
Oh well, there's always tomorrow!
