Do you think we worked hard?

Well, today we actually took care of the front garden - lawn mowing, cleaning old pampas grass leaves away from udnerneath (I hate to cut it back because it is massive and I fear it would not come back as gloriously, so instead in spring I rake out the dead 2-year-old leaves from underneath it), tidying up crips bags and plastic bottles, oh and clearing the overgrown pansy borders and I stuck in loads and loads of summer bulbs and some lobelias.

However, the reason of this thread is a "before and after" which actually makes me a bit proud!

This is before (taken about 2 years ago):


And this was this evening at around 8pm, I had just finished watering and thought what the heck, take a few pics anyway!


Any resemblance? The big pots are my vegetables and herbs, and in the wee pots I have 87 kohlrabi plants, freshly pricked out from their seed tray. I have another seed tray with round about the same number coming up. Kohlrabi is my favourite veg and I cannot buy it here - and this is the third year I am trying to grow it, but this year it will just move into bigger pots and not into the garden soil, as then the rabbits get ahead of me munching it!
If you are wondering whom we buried in that mound in the background - it is the grave of an old shed - we simply piled the old timber, laid membrane over it, shovelled over a ton of topsoil and then put onto that the strips of lawn that we cut up from the rest of the garden. There's some spring flowering bulbs in there but they did not quite make it this year yet, just foliage and one meagre bloom.

Anyway, as a matter of fact the picture is slightly misleading, it looks more like this:


Hubby and a friend from work are hoping to get the rest of the old fence to the right ripped up this week and then put up the new one (you can see some of it in the background), and then we get a skip and get rid of all that old fencing junk that's currently piled in the middle on my nicely levelled bit laid in terracotta-coloured hardwood chips on top of a nice thick soft-cushiony layer of bark chips.

The flower bed should hopefully look very different in a few weeks too, with lots of summer bulbs planted which are slowly coming up with all that nice weather at the moment.
I also found out that the parasol stand doubles wonderfully as rotary airer stand - no need to find a permanent spot for the laundry thing, just alternate it with the parasol for whichever is required. Works beautifully!

[ 10. May 2006, 09:54 PM: Message edited by: wishaw ]

 

The answer is "Yes!" I think you worked d*** hard!! Well done - hae a well-deserved rest under the parasol, with a nice cool drink!

 

Well done Wishaw - you have done a lot of work there.

I was too mean to get a skip, when I pulled a large shed down. I had a bonfire, then sprinkled the ash on the border.

 

Thanks - we could have had a bonfire with the old shed and could now also burn the old fencing stuff, but I am never too comfortable with open fire so close to the only valuable thing I possess apart from my life (my house), so a skip it is.
We spent so much money on fencing and plants and ground cover, the cost of a skip does not matter really. (What matters though is to get all the junk into the skip, we only have a narrow access path along the neighbouring property and all the old fencing is full of nails and screws and spikey pieces of mesh wire..)
Well, we got this far all by ourselves, I am sure we can handle getting rid of the junk! :D

 

What a difference. Alot a hard work, but the effort was really worth it. I hired a skip last year for my shed. Had thought about a bonfire but like you a bit concerned. Cost about �£100, but the good thing is you can have it as long as you need it. Only thing was because we were putting it in the road we had to get permission from the council, Quite easy though just filling out a form.

[ 11. May 2006, 10:45 AM: Message edited by: papajo ]

 

Fantastic changes Wishaw! Bet you must be feeling proud along with the aching muscles!

BTW - anyone any ideas about bonfires? We have a HUGE amount of dead plants material, weeds, bits of wood that are waiting for disposal.. should I be looking at burning and scattering like PeterS? Will the weeds and other assorted nasties make any difference (not Japanese knot weed or similar btw!!) - plus, would using fuel be good/bad/indifferent for the end results?

Ta!

 

Dave, I think as Wishaw and Papajo said the most important thing is safety. That means a decent distance from house, fences etc. Having said that you don't have to have a huge, out of control type, bonfire. My fires were never much larger than the fire that you have in a fireplace. I made a point of controlling carefully how much I put on, which means that I was by its side all the time. I did not put whole branches on. I cut everything up into smallish pieces that would lie very compactly, in exactly the same way as if I was burning it inside a fireplace. It is more work that way, but I felt that I was in control at every instant. I also had a fork with me and if it was burning too hard I could pull it apart very quickly. I even did it on the patio, without any harm to the patio. I covered an area larger than my fire was going to be with 2 or 3 inches of soil - which is a good heat insulator. I suspect you could do it on the grass without harming it.

You can do this if you have a lot of dry material especially wood. That only needs a small critical mass. When it is burning very hot, you can add other stuff - but slowly. The heat will certaily kill the weed seeds.

What I had was more of a small fire, rather than a traditional bonfire, where everything is heaped on.