Sometimes, we find ourselves working very hard on the house with very little to show for it at the end of the day (for example, doing boring prep work, sanding wood, masking, etc. – all things that are very important but not very satisfying to complete). Other times, like this weekend, we work very hard AND there is a nice, visible reward for our labors.
It started on Friday when we got a big delivery of top soil of our first planter. It came in a big dump truck and was dropped off on our front driveway. Ben, Christina and Katherine spend 3 hours moving the soil by wheelbarrow back and forth until almost all of it had been moved and compressed into the planter. (Ryan got a free pass on this one since he was flying back from a business trip in Copenhagen at the time). It was very exhausting labor, but oh wow, what a great feeling when it was done! Finally, our backyard planter is actually a planter!
These backyard planters are Ben’s little babies . If you don’t already know, Ben is very passionate about plants and gardening, so he has been waiting almost 3 years to be able to plant something into the ground in our backyard. Very exciting! He already had the bulk of the plants he wanted to add in there, but to round it out, he also made a trip to the nursery for some additional annuals and groundcover.
You may have noticed that another bit of progress we made was that we installed another fence panel on the west side of the house. Thanks to all of Christina and Katherine’s ongoing and dedicated staining work, we are now seeing even less of the overgrown property next door to us. As you may notice, we are planning on returning the fence back across the house so we will be able to block the view into our backyard from the street. We will build one more panel that cuts across, and then we will install a locking gate against the house. Soon we will be all buttoned up on that front!
Finally, we are almost done with the masonry for the second backyard planter. Ryan finished most of the third course of bricks. Next weekend we should be able to finish this bricking, and then once Ben lines the planter with waterproofing and insulation, we’ll be able to fill it with soil and have all of the plants in the ground! So exciting!!
It’s great to know that we are more than half-way done now with all of the backyard projects. We can’t wait to relax and enjoy all of our hard work!
This week we battled some hot and steamy weather as we slaved away some more in the backyard. The most major piece of progress was that Ryan got another course of bricks finished on the second planter! It really looks great; it's amazing what a difference the brick walls make. They help give the space some definition, and because the bricks are reclaimed, they add a nice vintage quality to the backyard.
Ben has also been busy prepping the first planter for planting. He applied sealant to the bricks to protect against water damage. Then he lined the interior walls with a tar-based waterproofing material. He had to use a blowtorch to adhere the lining to the brick... scary! Hopefully this coming week he can finish the prep work by applying insulation and a root mesh. Then, the planter will be ready for soil! Best case we'll be able to get soil delivered next weekend. We have to order it from a landscaping service to be delivered by dump truck because there will be so much (3 cubic yards!). It will be really exciting once we get some soil in there!
Katherine and Christina also contributed by staining more wood for the fence. Katherine even learned how to use the chop saw so that they don't have to rely on Ben and Ryan to do some simple cutting tasks. Hopefully this week we'll be able to assemble one more panel for the fence!
In between Fourth of July gatherings
and celebrations, the Palmer House team was able to make some solid
progress in the backyard over the long weekend. Now that the concrete curb for the second
planter was nice and set, Ryan was able to take everything he learned
from his dad - mixing the mortar, creating level guides, soaking the bricks, placing the bricks - and lay his first course of bricks all by himself!
Things were certainly slower going with only one bricklayer, especially since Saturday was bit of a wash because of some thundershowers. But the end results looked great! One course down, two more to go.
Once the first course was finished, Ryan also cleaned up the first planter so that Ben can begin prepping it for soil. Ryan used diluted acid to clean up the exterior bricks of any residual mortar.
Now that this is done, Ben will move on to sealing the bricks and then insulating and lining the inside of the planter. Hopefully in a couple of weeks we will be able to get a big top soil delivery for the planters!
Ben has also been working on the first of two gates we will need for our new fence. This week he stained and built a frame for the door. It will look similar to the other fence panels in design, but eventually we think we are going to need to fabricate a steel framing system for the door since it is going to be a bit too heavy for the post that will support it. We hope we can finish constructing the door this week.
Finally, we got a new addition to our backyard... a composter! We've been wanting to get one for a while now, and since we are doing this backyard project we made sure that we had a little nook reserved for it to reside in. It's sitting at the far end of the side planter. Eventually once the rest of the fence is assembled, the fence will cut across the driveway and enclose the composter in the corner.
We made sure to get a composter that is raised off of the ground to avoid problems with rats. We just need to give it a tumble every few days and that will keep it mixed up and happy. We have a LOT of inputs for the compost since we all eat so many vegetables. This summer we are participating in a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture). If you haven't heard of this before, it is like subscribing to a local farm. Basically we pay a subscription fee to a farm, and every week they provide us with a box of seasonal and very fresh veggies which we pick up at our neighborhood's farmer's market. Our farm, which is called Radical Root Farm, is a small, organic farm run by a young couple, and we absolutely love it! We have never had such wonderful and fresh produce. We split the box between all 4 of us, and we highly recommend it to anyone. The produce is so tasty and encourages us to eat different types of food (for example, we have gotten kohlrabi for the last two weeks which we had never eaten before!).
Anyways, we are planning to adding all of our veggie scraps to the compost all summer, and hopefully by next spring we will have a wonderfully fertile batch of soil for the planters!
The next few weeks we hope to make lots of progress on building the second planter and also prepping the first planter to be filled with soil. We have a lot of plants and we are eager to get them in the ground. Stay tuned for more updates!
