Thursday, June 05, 2008

Our Weed Patch Is Beautiful!

One of the ugliest features of our house, when we moved in, was a patch of dirt between our two driveways. Now one the ugliest one is Manuel.

Anyway, this patch would only grow weeds, and nothing else. We tried watering and doing all we could (we didn't know how to do much back then), and all we got were more and more weeds.



We had to keep looking at that ugly thing for the rest of the summer. We tried to fix its appearance a little bit by planting a couple of cherry trees, but it didn't help much. Then the snow came and covered it all. It was wonderful.

But when the snow melted, we were faced with that horrible thing we could only call "The Weed Patch."


We finally decided to do something about it, and resolved to cover it with rocks and things like that. We weren't sure what we wanted to do, but the first step was to get rid of the top soil. We wanted to rent a sod cutter, but it was big, and we don't have a truck. So, one day when it was raining, I thought that the ground might be soft enough, and started shoveling. It was a lot of work and it took three days, but it wasn't as bad as I thought.



We ended up putting a bunch of rocks, pavers, and mulch to cover all that indecent weedness that knew nothing of boundaries. This time we did need to borrow a truck. Fortunately, one of our neighbors was interested in some of the soil I shoveled off, so we traded: dirt for a truck. Awesome deal if there's ever been one.

Anyway, this is how the process looked:




And the final thing:


4 comments:

Hethrjem said...

Nice xeriscaping! Chad wants to xeriscape our front yard...someday...when we have a house, so that he won't have to mow another lawn!

Happy2Bme said...

Wow! Looking good! When do you want to do our yard? ;) It looks like you're finding things to do while school's out. Hopefully you're not as bored as my kids are!

Saine said...

It looked great the other day when we were there. I can't believe y'all have done so much to your house.

Amy Bury said...

The Meg and Manuel Zen Garden : )