Saturday 30 October 2010

The garden project completed...and a little extra on the allotment!

Well it's kind of late but I wanted to get this post up today. Having said that I am also very tired so if it turns out a little rambly please forgive me!!

OK...where to start?? I guess at the beginning is as good a place as any. My garden has always been child friendly and designed for the kids benefit so is quite low maintenance and grass and slabbed. A few years ago my Son decided he wanted a basketball hoop and saved up his pocket money and birthday money to buy one. Because of this I decided to take some of the grass up and lay slabs. It worked well even though I am no slab layer and they were all crooked and mismatched so didn't really do much for the whole
outlook on the garden it made my son incredibly happy.

Well the
basketball hoop has sat untouched for the last year and started to go rusty as the slabs sank even more. My hubby declared it was time to sort the garden out and I totally agreed but said I wanted to go back to having a nice lawn so that was the decision made. We also have a shed which ended up with quite a bit so ball damage so the wood was split in places and it was very well weathered...our shed is something like 12ft by 8ft which is an awful lot of shed and also has electrics in it so we looked into it and decided re-cladding was the way to go as it was a lot cheaper than replacing the shed.

Well work started on Wednesday when we lifted the slabs...there were about 80 in all and as we had spent the money out on them and didn't want to throw that money away I utilised most of them at the allotment giving me a couple of lovely stepping stone paths and also a walkway between my runner bean and grape fences. A few slabs left over were donated to my parents and a neighbour.

The kids helped me lift the slabs and we got it done in a couple of hours.


stepping stone pathstepping stone path

My two stepping stone paths to the shed and the greenhouse.

Work to re-clad the shed started on Thursday...we hired Dave to do this as it's his trade and he would also lay the new lawn as although I am quite handy I wanted a good, quick and efficient job done. As Dave finished one bit I went along with the creosote brush and also got the garden bench done at the same time. I didn't have the lawn laid right up to the fence as I decided another flower border would be nice next year.

re-cladding the shed

Dave starting work on the shed.

It took two days for Dave to complete the work and then I spent today tidying up, mowing the front lawns, and turning the soil for the new flower bed that has been under slabs for the last few years. I have to say I am very happy with how it has all turned out and can't wait to be able to sit out next summer and admire the garden...what do you think??

the compeleted garden project

The garden complete..and a lovely sunny day to show it off!!


So that is now finished and I have one extra job that I want to do on the allotment before it gets too cold but I will tell you more about that once I get on with it!!

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7 comments:

  1. It looks fab, and all done so quickly too. We had a lawn laid a few years ago, but it's now got a ten foot trampoline on it and the rabbit hutches stand on it in summer so it's very bare in places. Oh well, they're only kids for a short time.

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  2. That's a lot of work for just a few short days but the payoff is fabulous. Love the way you used the slabs at the allotment, looks fantastic. The shed looks great too and just look at that beautiful green grass.

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  3. Both look great Tanya. That is certainly some shed!!!

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  4. Wow, what a lovely garden project you had there. Job well done.

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  5. Nice shed and grass carpet! Is the rooftop meant to be slightly curved at the center?

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  6. Lol Vs...it is an old shed and when it was originally put up 15 years ago the roof was level...wood moves though so now it is a little curvy...especially when the kids thought it was a good climbing frame, I like to think it adds character!! Thankfully it's still solid though!!

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  7. That's a pretty amazing transformation! You would give the ground force team a run for their money - whatever happened to groundforce?

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keep it clean...keep it relevant...I look forward to reading your comments!!