Projects for 2010

As it's been raining a lot, I've made a list of projects for next year.

I want to use some brick paviors to create an edge to the main border in both the front and back garden. This will stop the edges "creeping" and I'll be able to run over them with the flymo, so no strimming of the edge any more. Like this.




I've decided to replace the felt on my tea-house roof, (before I get any older) it has a couple of patches, is still water-tight but was last done fifteen years ago.
It's always a problem of when to do it. I can remember from last time. I need a couple of dry days, the weather needs to be mild enough for the felt to remain supple, but not warm enough for the bitumen to melt and the grit to get smudged as I clamber over it. I've a window-dresser's heavy duty staple gun which is great for tacking it when you fold it over the eaves. Almost impossible to use a hammer and tacks in that position.

But I'm not looking forward to do any of this.

Anyone else made any plans?

 

Its always good to make plans for next year - especially when it's a cold and miserable day like today!

I have got a greenhouse to finish before spring - building my own lean-to, half greenhouse, half potting shed

Also been thinking about a veranda at the front of my allotment shed but not sure whether I ought to re-roof the shed first

Then I've also got a book on Pebble Mosaics and am sorely tempted to create something

 

I would like to build a "roof" over my small pool, (I mean pergola, and put netting on it) so the leaves can't get in, but knowing my luck they would get in round the sides, which would then mean it would have to have sides, and if it has sides it would have to have a back, if it has a back it would have to have a front, if it has a front it would need a door, if it has a door.................

oh why did I reply to this

 

Exactly!

In the past I've put heavy duty bubble-wrap over my pool and a net and the pesky leaves still get in.

Digressing..
I've made a special tool for use if the bottom drain ever gets clogged with leaves that purging with releasing the standpipe won't shift. It's a plastic Coke bottle on the end of a pole. I use itas a plunger as it has roughly the same diameter of the sump's socket.

 

Thanks for the nice comment on my bricklaying skills.

I have used small pieces of York stone before, but it irritated me that I always had to weed out the grass which grew between every piece.

I understand what you mean about "formal" but I don't think it will be too noticeable as the azaleas and a few other perennial plants we intend to put in next year will hide it a bit. It'll also darken down as will my other circles after a year or so. But it's the convenience I'm looking for.
I'm now planning for the next ten years or so, I don't want to have too much bending to do when I'm eighty!

 

Grass can be so bloody-minded, you can put seed down on a thin patch and it'll refuse to grow, yet between every stone in a border......

I actually pull up little bits of grass and the root I occasionally find growing in the beds and use them as plugs where the squirrels have dug a bigger hole in the lawn that you can't repair as you would a pitch mark on a golf green.