People who know me well know that about 3 years ago, my wife and I bought a house in need of a lot of TLC. This week's decision has been that we should redo the garden before hay fever season makes it horrendous to go outside.
We've got a lot ahead of us. The grass isn't appropriate for a lawn, there's stones everywhere, and Rachael wants a vegetable patch. The current plan of campaign is to use two weekends to do it.
Weekend 1 plans
- Hire a sod cutter and remove the entire top surface of the garden.
- Tear down the remains of the shed.
- Place new turf over the lawn area.
- Cover the area that's going to be vegetable garden with plastic sheeting.
- Cover the area that'll be used to extend the patio with plastic sheeting.
- Cover the area that'll be used for a new shed with plastic sheeting.
Weekend 2 plans
- Buy a new shed, cement, and a taller pole for the satellite dish.
- Cement in the tall pole.
- Move the satellite dish and recable.
- Lay the shed foundations.
- Put up the new shed (just for storage space, no need for power/light).
- Lay extra patio.
- Start putting in raised beds (large) for the vegetable garden.
As you can see, this is a fairly hefty work plan; I hope we're up to it...
If the garden is really stoney, a sod cutter will probably be more hassle than it's worth. It may be worth putting a little elbow grease in and dig up the sods yourself - it'll give you a chance to remove some of the larger stones (and if your garden is anything like ours, you'll find some huge boulders there too!). If you stack the cut sods well, the grass'll compost down well and you can cheat a little to save some work in the short term by using the sods as borders to separate parts of the garden up.
ReplyDeleteFrom experience, I'd suggest that laying turf should be the last thing you do to the garden - a) it gives you a chance to change your mind, and b) it then won't be disturbed/muddied/rippied up by any other works you do - you *always* need a place to dump/build things and that would be ideal.
I used decking planks to make our raised beds (after wanting something which looked half decent and pricing everything up, they were by far the cheapest option) - Took some pics after I built them last year: http://picasaweb.google.com/vitellconsulting/Garden?authkey=Gv1sRgCPGmxJ_jobbNEA&feat=directlink
Have fun!