Non-Gardener builds an Observatory, Garden Railway and even Dabbles with Plants!

The Japanese Barberry ( I think ) also got its tree ring, but desperately needed a hair cut. Lynne also raised the lawn level around these, as there were a number of large dips where the lawn mower kept grounding. The area was improved, but still needs a little more soil, which we'll order next spring with other stuff we need delivered.



By the end of the day, three tree rings were fitted, filled and the earth levelled around them and I'd got all the sleepers painted two coats in dark oak. The shed would have to wait for another day.

 

I like the dark oak. It blends into the garden better and is easier on the eye.

 

Lynne and I both agree. When we first painted the shed in medium oak, it dried much more orange than the lighter brown we expected, but really didn't want to spend a fortune on paint straight away. We gave it a couple of years to weather before spending any more money, as the garden expenditure was approaching the GDP of a small country!

25th July 2024

I think I gave myself a day off on the 25th, as after all the painting the day before, my arm was going to fall off. I did have a wander around the garden with my camera, to catch the progress of the green stuff.



I had a bit of a play around with a mirror for a few shots too, a couple of which are shown below.

 

26th July 2024

The following day was spent painting the shed in two coats of the dark oak. Some of the T&G planking had warped and opened up gaps between the planks. It was like this when we moved in, which I'm guessing is because the shed never had any protection. After the shed paint was dry, I went around the gaps with some dark brown silicone to close them up.



I took another break from the garden in the last few days of July, fixing a damaged thread on the engine block of one of my Jeeps and then fitting a new cylinder head gasket.



31st July 2024

I got back to the garden on the 31st, preparing the side path to be re-laid. The original slabs had been laid onto a dry cement mix, which had then been watered to set it. As a result, while it had set, it hadn't really bonded to the paving slabs. This had made it fairly easy for me to pull them up.

The slabs were a mix of two feet square, two by one and one by one feet stones. The were all slightly different thicknesses and it had left this pattern and height difference in the cement foundation.

I didn't want to break all this out to relay the path, but some areas were going to be too high for the new stones. So I set to with my angle grinder, lowering all the joints and high spots to give a much more level surface to lay the new stones on. We then started searching for any paving that might be a close match to the originals.

 

We had two of our vehicles on show at Ushaw Historic House and Gardens over the first weekend of August, so didn't get back to the garden until the 6th.



6th August 2024

When we got back, we found that our garden fox had left muddy footprints all along the sleeper wall! We've never seen him or her, but have been left rather smelly gifts every so often!



Back to reality and general maintenance; the Laurel needed trimming again.

 

I only got part way along the curved driveway hedge on the 6th. To cut all the Laurel in the garden is a multi-day project. Sometimes I use hedge trimmers, but that always results in dead brown leaves in the top of the hedge, so often I'll just use secateurs on the top and the hedge trimmer on the sides.



Checking on the Creeping Jenny, it was starting to fill in the earth border behind the garage. That had previously been quite a dark damp area, but with the Hawthorn cut right back, it got the late afternoon sun.

 

7th August 2024

The next morning, I was back to Laurel trimming. The plastic sheet makes the clear up so much easier on the gravel drive. One hedge down, another four to go!



10th August 2024

I think it was on the 9th, when the fifteen paving stones were delivered. We couldn't find the same or even similar colour, but we did find a pattern that was almost identical. I did have a plan for the colour.

On the 10th, I began to lay them. I mixed up a dry powder of sand and cement, which had to be quite thin, on top of the original concrete.

 

The last two stones by the gate, needed cutting down to fit before the front drive and trimming to fit under the gatepost. Once all down, I watered the path to allow the moisture to soak in to all the dry powder to set it. I got finished a little before 2pm.



I was back out late afternoon with a pot of paint I'd mixed up. I made a blend of dark oak shed paint, a little pink interior emulsion and waterproof PVA glue and got a shade that wasn't too far off the original paving. Perhaps it was a fraction too pink, but it wasn't bad.

I then used a sponge to dab the paint onto the paving stones, in random splotches, to colour the slabs. I added a little more dark oak or pink in some areas, so all the stones weren't the same shade. The paint was quite transparent, so I could gradually build up the density over the grey stone.

By 5pm, all the stones were painted and while not a perfect match, looked pretty good. They should weather in to match in time. I gave them a couple of hours to dry and went back out to add a dry sand/cement mix to point all the joints. That was packed down and I then watered it.

 

I got a full day's work out of Lynne too. She started clearing various rubbish and rubble that had been along the workshop hedge. We still had a partial bag of slates for the patio, some soil and building sand.



There was one large bulk bag, full of brick and concrete rubble, which she emptied into smaller rubble sacks. These were all piled up by the side wall, ready to be taken to the tip.

 

While parts of my path were drying, I also cleaned up some more useable bricks. I wanted some spares for just in case projects and also wanted a stack to put the garage rain barrel on. This would lift the barrel high enough to get a watering can under the barrel tap.



In addition to bagging rubble, Lynne got the last tree ring fitted and used up some of the remaining top soil, building up hollows in the lawn around the ring. It had been a very busy day for us both, but good progress was made.

 

19th & 22nd August 2024

On the 19th, I got the stack of bricks moved to behind the garage. One of the old paving slabs from the lawn, was then placed on top, followed by the water barrel.

On the 21st, I removed all the garage guttering and refitted it draining towards the barrel.



The next day, I cut up another damaged water barrel and used its base as a lid for this barrel. I also spent much of the day moving stuff!

The remaining bulk bag of slates was emptied onto the slate area in front of the sun room. The building sand was moved to two small rubble sacks and stored in the shed. The bulk bag of soil was barrowed down to the railway and tipped into the back left corner, around the neighbour's large conifer. That left the workshop Laurel stretch empty for the first time in about two years!

 

23rd August 2024

By this time, the Lupin was fading and going to seed. I know I could have cut it a bit earlier to get some more flowering out of it, but I wanted to collect the seed this year. I had plans for more Lupins along the back of the railway.



Some of the pods were already dry, brown and rattling, so those were cut and popped open. Not a bad harvest from one flower. They were bagged, labelled and stored in my workshop seed drawer.

 

25th August 2024

I planted out five Rock Cress cuttings I'd taken earlier in the year. They filled in a few gaps at each end of the railway border.



The additional plants we'd bought, must have been a slightly different variety, than those originally transplanted from the kitchen border, as the leaves were larger. I also added another large rock as a stepping stone, to make it easier to reach the square paving slab at the top of the bank.

 

Later in the day, I trimmed the inside edge of the Hawthorn, where a number of small branches were sticking out towards the path.



To finish off, I took some cuttings from an Euonymus japonicus spindle shrub and Abelia. I think that's what they are, but I'm still heavily relying on my Plant ID app on my phone. I tend to take photos on the app and see what it says, then do an image search on my laptop and see if the internet agrees with the phone app!

Anyway, I took several cuttings, dunked them in some rooting hormone, potted and covered them. I didn't know whether it was the right time of year, but as I'd had to trim the shrubs anyway, I thought I'd give it a go with the cuttings. If they survived, I had gaps in the woodland where they could go.

 

27th & 28th August 2024

I spent much of the 27th, cleaning up bricks and stacking them by the garage fence, ready to be passed over and stored by the water barrel. The rest of the rubble was bagged up, loaded into the car and over two trips, planted at the council tip.



By the end of the day, the area was tidy again for the first time in a long while. I needed some new river gravel to re-surface the area by the rebuilt wall, but that was probably going to wait until we had other building materials to be delivered.